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Entered according to Act of Congres3, in the year 1868, by Moorhead, 
Simpson & Bond, in the Clerk’s Office of the District 
Court of the United States for the South- 
ern District of New York. 


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AG ATH YN IAN PRESS. 



✓ 





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4 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Chapter I. How Alethithcras and the Schoolmaster of 

Medamou set out together. . . ... page 1 

II. How the travelers made a flying visit to Panta - 
chou t and were satisfied with seeing a single city. . 4 

III. How they sail for Liburnum , are initiated in the 
mysteries of pudding -making, and arrive at Cebel- 
al-Tarik. . 20 


IV. They go up Tank's Mountain , and are rewarded 
hy free lodgings in Quarantine , where loth get Ut- 
ter t, and Alethi pleasurably 29 

V. Alethitheras finds the insect that bit him , but fails 
to catch it. They climb the tower at Clinlpurgos , 
and meet on top a nondescript 36 

VI. They go to the City, of .Art, where Alethi gives a 
lesson to a would-be dilletante 49 

VII. How the traveler found what was lost , and con-* 
tinned his journey pleasantly to Ariospolis. ... 64 


iv 


COST ETN T S . 


Ylfl. They visit the great temple of Ariospolis. What 
they saw therein , and what they had to see there- 


out. 61 

IX. The Schoolmaster discourses on appearances , and 
in conclusion makes a confession 68 

X. The Artist who worked without models. ... 73 


XI. Minnchen's picture , and what came of it. The 
Schoolmaster philosophizes thereon 77 

XII. They visit the scene of an earthquake. On the 
way , the Schoolmaster tells a history . Carradora. 81 

XIII. Alethi falls into a new peril of the heart. How 

he escaped , through the advice of the Schoolmaster. 92 

XIY. Love and self-love : a sermon on a kiss. . . . 102 

XV. How the travelers left Parthenopl , but got into 


the woods and were obliged to return 105 

XYI. They visit the city of Departed Splendor , take a 
look at the Ptochalazons , and settle down in Mon - 
achopolis . . . , . 110 

XVII. They see an extraordinary picture , and witness 

a decapitation by the sword. 118 


XYI1I. They go to the kingdom of Cliassen and visit 
Blinrt, where Philoscommon gives an ethic lesson 
in art-matters. Sursia is passed by, but not for- 
gotten 128 

XIX. They descend to the middle region of lakes and 
mountains , where the younger traveler is enlighten- 
ed unpleasantly 133 


CONTENTS. 


V 


XX. What they found in the capital of the Alectry- 
ons ; and hoio the little pedagogue displayed his 
manhood. . . . . .138 

XXI. Philoscommon opens the hook of Government for 
his companion , who is disgusted and disheartened 
at what he reads there. 147 

XXII. The Emperor of the Alectryons. Our travelers 
set out to go to the Opera, hut are made spectators 
of an unfinished political tragedy in the public 
street. 152 

XXIII. They arrive in Septicollis , and after a pleasant 
sojourn leave from a seaport of the country for 
Chaunopolis , and find on hoard the packet a 
notorious female character 159 

XXIV. In Chaunopolis : where Alcthi himself has a 
painful experience of what his fellow-traveler un- 
derwent in Lutetia 164 

XXV. Alethitheras makes a pleasant acquaintance, 
witnesses a tender scene in the comedy of high life , 
hears a native orator , and becomes cognizant of 
various other products of an advanced civilization. 168 

XXVI. They visit the public Galleries , and on their way 
see something more of the dark side of the Great 
Metropolis. The Schoolmaster makes a favorable 
impression on Philetus , their new acquaintance. .177 

XXVII. Our travelers are visited by Philetus , and become 
engaged in discussing the rights of strong nations 
and the wrongs of weak. 184 

XXVIII. They go to the playhouse , where they see a famous 
novel-writer. Philetus indulges in a criticism on a 
never-to-be-criticised dramatic genius 193 


vi 


CONTENTS. 


XXIX. The discussion carried into the domain of morals , 
where the Schoolmaster opens his companion's eyes 


unpleasantly 206 

XXX. The prize-fight which they did not go to. Philos - 

common sermonizes on Philautian fair-play. . . 212 

XXXI. Athlia 218 

XXXII. The ballet-dancers 223 

XXXIII. The travelers make an excursion into the world 

of spirits 226 

XXXIV. They attend an election , and are satisfied with 

the beauties of restricted suffrage 232 


XXXV. They embark for Taprosheo , and come to the 
Land of Kind. What they found there ; with the 
savory discourse of the Schoolmaster thereon. . . 239 

XXXVI. Wherein the travelers have bared to them the 
beauties of Philautian humanity in the Land of 
Hind 250 

XXXVII. They visit a field of blood , and learn the Phil- 
autian state-logic of grapeshot and gunpowder. . 257 

XXXVIII. Tells how a grandson of the Duke of Pach- 
ycephalus came to honor them with an interview . 
Charmed with his sketches of military service in 
Serica , Alethitheras abandons the idea of visiting 
that ancient country 2G6 

XXXIX. The surgeon proposes to go with them to Ves- 
putia , and by accident opens a • new window of his 
mind. 276 


CONTENTS. 


vii 


XL. The conflagration at sea. The fate of Crym- 
olcer. How Aletliitheras owed his preservation to 
the little schoolmaster's coolness and foresight. . . 277 

XLI. The voyage to Chrysocho'ra. A Vesputian 
Editor enlarges even Philoscommon's experience 
in the manners and thought-habits of his country- 
men 285 


XLIL The travelers arrive in Chrysopolis. How they 
met there a runaway acquaintance ; and ichat en- 
sued \ 296 

XLIII. They visit their friend the Editor , and get an 

insight into more things than they expected. . . 301 

XLIV. How they passed by the Land of the Puffins. . 308 


XLV. Wherein they visit the North- West. Philoscom - 
mon takes occasion to descant on the naturalization- 
laws^ and shows the effect of an excessive foreign 


element upon the spint of nationality. .... 312 

XLYI. Criminal justice in Tsopoliteia 317 

XL VII. The travelers come to Botolph's Town , where a 

delightful surprise awaits Aletlii. 322 


XLVTII. How Botolph's Townsmen showed themselves to be 
lovers of free speech. Philetus , declining a Vespu- 


tian metamorphosis , returns to his country without 
plumage , and as wise as he left it. 325 

XLIX. The Medamousians arrive in New Euerwic , 
where Alethitheras finds 1 through more senses than 
one , a good deal to astonish him 327 


Till 


CONTENTS. 


L. Containing f urther views , not “ dissolving ” 0710 s, 

<?/ 77i<g corruption , the extravagance , ^0 misery , tf7*0 
charities , 0 / ^20 (7#y of Nasty Splendor. . . . 338 

LI. ZZwfl 77i<? travelers meet again Hilarius , ar<3 

present at the death-bed of the false and, forsaken. . 343 

LII. Relates the outbreak of a mighty rebellion in the 
Great Republic , and its moral effects on the mag- 
nanimous nations of Philautia and Alectoreion. . 349 

LIII. Which records the unheard-of cruelties of the 
rebel leaders , with the malice and mendacity of their 
pseudo-government. 355 

Liy. Our travelers meet again the grandson of the 
Duke of Pachycephalus. His luminous discourse 
upon the war , and how the little schoolmaster 


answered him 360 

LY. Wherein is related the end of the rebellion. The 
magnanimity of the victors and the ungraciousness 
of the vanquished. . 365 

LVI. The Assassination of the Archon 370 

LVII. How the great army of Isopoliteia was disbanded , 
and its thousand ships dispersed ; with the conse- 
quences thereof an PMlautian integrity . . . .372 


378 


LV1II. The Traveler begins to weary. 
LIX. The Grand Result. . . . 


. 380 


TRAVELS 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 










. 



k 







TRAYELS BY SEA AND LAND 


OF 


ALETHITHERAS. 


CHAPTER I. 

How Alethitheras and the Schoolmaster of Medamou 
set out together. 

11 But how are we to manage ?” quoth Philoscommon. 

“ As others do, surely. Is there any mystery in travel, 
any at least that money will not solve ?” asked Alethitheras, 
smiling. 

“ Not for you. But I ” 

“ Are not too proud, I hope, to share my knapsack ? ” 

“ Ou ma Dia ! I am not so dainty,” said Philoscommon, 
with a conceited twist of his extraordinary nose, — which 
seemed to have no bone ; and he appeared to snuff the air, 
as if there was something rank prevailing, and he wanted 
to show he was not afraid of it. “ Besides, I render an 
equivalent in my company : ” (another twist, comical too, 
but of a different expression.) 

1 


2 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ And in your knowledge,” added Aletkitlieras. 

“ If you like,” quoth Philoscommon, bowing. “ But it is 
nothing of that. I meant, in what relation are we to appear 
to one another ?” 

“ What other than that of companions ? ” exclaimed Aleth- 
itheras, in astonishment. 

“ It is impossible,” said Philoscommon. “ Look at me.” 

Aletkitlieras looked, and felt the force of the objection. 

The schoolmaster of Medamou was, indeed, no beauty. 
With his narrow little body, spindle shanks, and monstrous 
head, he looked like a mushroom, or a seven-month foetus. 
Add to this, his features were grotesquely ugly, and the ad- 
vantage they derived from a very animated expression of 
great intelligence, and uncommon acquirements, was more 
than counterbalanced by the oddity of his mien and ways ; 
for his India-rubber nose seemed always in motion, like the 
trunk of an elephant ; his huge in-fallen and toothless mouth 
was equally restless, and carried the heavy protuberant chin 
along with it ; -when he sat, it was usually as if his chair 
burned him, and when he w T alked he presented his side, 
like a dog that trots, or a crab on dry land. The very 
shrewdness of his twinkling gray eyes, "whose under lids 
when he talked were perpetually making advances to their 
partners and threw the whole orbit into convulsions, had a 
jocularity that was certainly very conspicuous, but was any- 
thing but distinguished. 

“ Why, it would defeat your very object,” said Philos- 
common resuming, as his keen little eyes detected, but with- 
out exciting in him any other emotion than that of mirth, 
the difficulty which in his urbanity Alethitheras had to keep 
from laughing. “I do passably for a pedagogue. My 
brows frighten,” (here he made a physiognomical parody of 
Jove;) “ and when the boys are down in the mouth, I show 
them mine turned upward,, and they have much ado, as you 
have now, to keep their countenance. Fancy us then to- 


OF ALETHITHEHAS. 


3 


getlier ! you with your magnificent figure and thorough- 
bred ah*, and me ! ” Putting his hands under his coat- 
tails, he strutted off majestically on his chicken legs, with a 
wriggle of his high-placed rump that was irresistible. 

“ For Heaven’s sake ! ” cried Alethitheras, giving way 

to a mirth that overflowed him. 

“Exactly,” said Pliiloscommon, as he faced about and 
bowed profoundly. “ People would die of laughter, and 
you would get admittance nowhere in refined society. But, 
as your valet ” 

“ My valet ! ” cried his friend, no longer laughing. 

“ Why not ? Does that alter my qualities ? When we 
are alone, we shall be friends, but otherwise I am your hum- 
ble servant in appearance,” (sweeping the floor with his bon- 
net in mock humility,) “ as I am in effect.” 

There was no use in combating the proposition ; for the 
pertinacious chin, drawing up, seemed to shut the door 
against the egress of any fiirther opinion. So it was agreed 
to. 

“ Let us go first to the land of Pantachou,” said the valet- 
elect, now counselor. “ It is of little matter, I suppose, at 
which end we begin.” 

“ None in the world,” said Alethitheras. 

So they went first to the land of Pantachou 


4 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER II. 

How the travelers made a flying visit to Pantachou , and 
were satisfied with seeing a single city. 

Pantachou is a region whose limits are very difficult to 
define. It has the same advantages as any other quarter of 
the globe, and consequently similar disadvantages. Sea- 
coast and river-channel; hill and valley; tableland and 
plain ; both extremes of the thermometer ; great cities, small 
towns, and insignificant villages ; varieties of races, and of 
all degrees of civilization ; everything, — above the ground, 
on the ground, or under the ground, — is there as elsewhere. 
“ And of course,” added Philoscommon, who was preparing 
his friend and occasional master for the scene, “ you must 
expect to find there, as in other countries, numerous and per- 
petually obtruding vices, with sparse and rarely seen virtues. 
In fact, it is an epitome of the whole world ; and as it is a 
sort of central spot, or hub of the wheel so to say, with roads 
that radiate like spokes to all points of the compass, so 
that you can turn from it whither you will, by land or by 
water, it will make a very good first place of observation. 
But I think you will be sick of it, before your eyes be 
tired.” 

“ Why, what is the national character ? ” 

“You may judge by the popular amusement, which is 
standing on one’s head.” 

“Pah! You jest.” 

“ Not at all. You will find it, everywhere you go, the 


OF ALETHITIIEEAS. 


5 


favorite diversion. It is only in Medamou that people keep 
their right end always uppermost.” 

“ And here we are,” he said when they had reached their 
destination, and cutting a caper, “ here we are in Pantachou, 
in one of its capital cities.” 

“ What do you call it ? ” asked the younger traveler. 

“ Chiliopolis.” 

“ Have you ever been here before ? ” said Alethi. 

“ Certainly. Every mousehole in it is as familiar to me as 
a page in one of my own class-books or an angle in the 
Pons Asinorum. I would, for your sake, I knew as much of 
other places to which we are going.” 

11 What does that boy want with us ? and now that 
other ? ” 

“ To carry our luggage. — Not so fast, my little people ! ” 

“ They are the pleasantest fellows of their kind I ever 
saw,” exclaimed Alethitheras, quite delighted with their dim- 
ples and beaming eyes. “Are all the Chiliopolitans as 
amiable ? ” 

“ When they expect to get anything.” 

At this moment a man with a whip in his hand stepped 
up, pushed aside the boys, and laid his hand on one of the 
portmanteaus, at the same time saying something gruffly. 
Whereupon the boys began to struggle with him for the pos- 
session of the strangers’ effects, and one of them, quite red 
in the face with rage, uttering a volley of some abuse, 
kicked at the shins of the man like a little maniac, and was 
answered by a crack of the whip that made him let go, but 
only to use his tongue still more volubly and to gesticulate 
with great energy. At all of which Philoscommon appeared 
to be in ecstacy, as Alethitheras was in amaze. 

“ What is the matter ? ” asked the latter. “ I cannot make 
out their jargon.” 

“ The fellow with the whip says the gentlemen will want 
a carriage ; and the amiable little Chiliopolitans send him 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


to a place you wot of, with certain unctuous expletives that 
are quite common to the Pantachousian tongue, but are never 
used before ladies.” 

“ What a disagreeable people ! ” said Alethitheras. 

“ When they are disappointed,” rejoined Philoscommon. 

“ But what are we to do ? ” 

“ Let the coachman have our things.” 

“ So it will be better : you see the boys have got at my 
head already. — Oh, if I had you in Medamou,” added the 
schoolmaster, facing about and shaking his nose at the 
young gentlemen, “how soon I would turn you upside 
down ! ” 

“ Are you sure you are not turned upside down yourself, 
old fellow ? ” cried one of them. “ What a head ! ” 

A roar of laughter from all the blackguards around wel- 
comed this sally. Philoscommon himself joined in the mer- 
riment, though less obstreperously, and rewarded the ready 
urchin with a piece of money, which had a wonderful effect 
in making him serious. “ Let him laugh that wins, they say ; 
but you see,” remarked the sage of Medamou, “ this fellow 
laughed before he won, and now is sober.” 

“ Thanks" to your open hand,” said Alethitheras. 

“Which saved my head,” replied the philosopher with a 
twist of his proboscis. “ Nothing blunts the edge of libel 
like current metal.” And the travelers entered the coach. 

“ Drive slowly,” said Alethi. 

“ What hotel ? ” asked the coachman. 

“ Corcojplethes ,” replied Philosc. “ Slowly, my Phaeton.” 

Phaeton ascended his box, and put his horses to a half- 
gallop. 

Alethitheras pulled the check and reminded him of the 
order. 

“ That is not the medium,” said his companion. “ Let me 
teach you. Double fare, driver; we are invalids.” The 
horses walked at once. 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


7 


“ Fie ! ” remonstrated the younger traveler. “ Could you 
not have told him we wanted to look about us ? ” 

“ I did not tell him anything. I merely indicated the de- 
sired pace, — betwixt a nuptial and a funeral gait. You are 
too scrupulous for Pantachou. Simple truth is respected only 
in Medamou.” 

As they rolled along, Alethitheras remarked the number of 
glittering equipages that passed them. “ Are these all peo- 
ple of rank ? ” he asked. 

“ Not all, nor even the greater part of them. Can you dis- 
tinguish between the Dii majorum gentium and the novi hom- 
ines ? ” 

“ I cannot tell those who are of rank, but I think I may 
with some degree of certainty pronounce who are not. That 
man there, for example, who sits so disdainful and stiff in the 
middle of his crimson cushion.” 

Philoscomon twisted his proboscis up and down and from 
side to side with great animation. “That,” said he, “is the 
son of the identical tobacconist for whose carriage the face- 
tious motto, ‘Quid rides?’ was devised. The old nose- 
feeder gave a particular flavor to his confection by uric acid, 
and amassed a fortune through its grateful piquancy. The 
son, who, like the father of Titus, finds nothing in the coin 
that savors of the mint, snuffs up the air as though he were 
a full-blooded hound. Now mark that old gentleman, in 
whose veins flows, or should flow, the generous blood of cen- 
turies of honored ancestry. With what gentle urbanity and 
what unaffected grace he looks about him, unwilling to pass 
unnoticed any one who has claims to his salute ! ” 

“ What now ! ” exclaimed Alethi in surprise. “ I never 
thought you a favorer of aristocracy.” 

“ Nor am I. Stars and garters ! there are puppies in the 
kennel of gentility whom you never can train, and whom it 
were idle to flog except that they merit it. But if one must 
be ridden over or kicked to death, I would rather it should 


8 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


be by the hoofs of a gallant barb than the heels of a jack- 
ass.” 

“They must be a wealthy people, these Pantachousians 1 ” 

“ Look on the pavement.” 

“ Rags, misery, and mendicity ! What a contrast ! ” 

“It always must be the case where wealth is unequally dis- 
tributed, and it never can be otherwise, in the nature of 
things, because wealth is self-accumulating, and indigence 
goes on descending in the scale of ineptitude ; so that the 
poor add to the capital of the rich, who in return depress the 
wages of industry through the excess of unemployed and 
competitive labor. But look at those pompous buildings ! 
They are one of the results of this partiality in fortune. A 
nation is aggrandized at the expense of individual suffering. 
There would be no great works were means doled out in 
driblets instead of being gathered into vast reservoirs to flow 
through great canals with the volume and velocity of rivers.” 

“ I see one of those huge piles is a H >spital for the cure of 
Consumption, and another for Cancerous Diseases.” 

“ Both are Pantachousian endemics.” 

“ They speak at least well for the charity of the people ! ” 

“Yes, there is no want of active benevolence, especially for 
objects taken in the mass ; the private channels of distribu- 
tion are less effective. Providence converts even man’s osten- 
tation to goodly ends.” 

“ There is a Lying-in Asylum. But I have observed no 
Foundling Hospital.” 

“ There is none in Pantachou. But it is not for want of 
immorality, as those insidious or outrageous placards on the 
walls and peripatetic on men’s shoulders will intimate.” 

“ There are many fine men among the pedestrians. But it 
is not in nature that their mothers should be such shaped 
women as all the well-dressed of the latter sex appear to be. 
Where do they come from ? ” 

“ They are not autochthones , nor are they produced by 


OF ALETHITHEKAS, 


9 


those gaunt images of famine that stand so abjectly on the 
•curbstone.” 

“ But who however, even in their meagreness, are of more 
congenial proportions than those flaunting creatures. Why, 
the extremity of their trunks is of more amplitude than the 
bottom of a wine-butt, and their waist in proportion is as 
slender as the animal stalk that connects the breast and belly 
of an ant or wasp. They look like bumblebees magnified 
into human dimensions and serving as animate laywomen for 
milliners and mantuamakers. Unless I had seen an ant or 
wasp make her way into a little worm-hole, I could not con- 
ceive it possible to swing about such a huge rotundity of 
base without upsetting.” 

“ That is because you do not know its composition,” said 
Philoscommon, with a delightful laugh, that may have come 
of superior knowledge, or possibly from a less selfish source. 
u At first it was a coffee-bag, or layer of starched calico, but 
now it is a haircloth petticoat, or bottomless churn of some 
cotton cloth hooped round with whalebone or wire. See how 
the little creatures sweep the ground about them ! Those 
long dresses, which at first were so stately in a drawingroom, 
were found to hide bad ancles. Hark the little cloud that 
follows them, hovering just above the pavement. That is 
what is called ‘ kicking-up a dust,’ and indicates personal 
importance.” 

“ But when the flags are muddy, they must be draggle- 
tailed.” 

“ No, they hold up the outer dress with both hands and 
take particular pains to wear fresh underpetticoats. It i3 
the drollest sight in the world to see a dumpy little woman 
step along in this fashion, especially if she wear men’s boots 
as some of them do, or show her calves. In Chaunopolis, the 
great city of Philautia, which we shall one day visit, they 
carry this comedy of action to the greatest perfection of 
scenic effect, and you may see hundreds of women, or might 
1 * 


10 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


some years since, for it was before tbe restoration of hoops, 
walking in this classical costume, looking before like country 
maids under a cherry tree in fruit-time, and behind like what 
you may imagine.” 

“ They do it then by habit.” 

“ Certainly ; and so used are their legs to being undraped, 
that they are unconscious of the fresh air and never know 
how high they lift. I actually, one sunshiny day, saw in one 
of their great Parks a fat little duck-legged •woman, as broad 
almost as she was long, and made still broader by this ele- 
gant disposition of drapery, carrying her coats so high over 
the dry gravel-walk that she showed behind above her gar- 
ters. You may imagine the stare and interchanged glances 
of the promenaders. Even my ugly phiz was unnoticed in the 
merriment. I longed to overhaul her and tell her, ‘ Madam, 
the barometer is rising ; you can shake down your courses/ 
But away she scudded, with a double reef in her spanker.” 

“Ah I fear, then,” said Alethi sighing, “ there are in modem 
days no natural, well-dressed and graceful women.” 

“ Andromachen a fronte videbis ; 

Post, minor est : 

“ very few indeed,” replied his more experienced friend, “ ex- 
cept in the city of Medamou and country of Medamothi.” 

They approached a very grand edifice. Knots of people 
were seen grouped about the entrance, and many persons 
passing up and down through the vestibule. “ What have 
we here ? ” asked Alethi. 

“ The temple of Justice, where they sacrifice equity,” re- 
plied Philos'. “ A remarkable case is going on, as I learned 
to-day from one of our fellow-travelers. A lady ordered a 
man to be shot dead in the act of trespassing on her grounds 
to carry-on a correspondence by letter with her maiden 
daughter. The victim was a married man.” — 

“ Therefore deserved punishment,” interrupted Alethi. 


OP ALETHITHER AS. 


11 


“ But not in that mode,” resumed Philosc, “ nor at her 
hands. A famous advocate will conclude to-day for the de- 
fence. Let us go in for a few moments.” 

“We shall hardly gain admittance.” 

' “ Only apply the universal key, the doors will open ; Jus- 
tice is used to it.” 

The check was pulled. “We shall alight for a few mo- 
ments,” said Alethi. 

“As you please, sir,” said the driver deferentially, and 
opening the' door. 

“We shall consider your civility, in the fare,” added Alethi, 
“ and shall not be long.” 

“Never mind, sir,” returned the driver. “ Take your own 
time, gentlemen.” 

“ You see the effect,” said Philoscommon. “ Apply boldly 
the same mollifier.” 

There was an immense crowd. The hall was filled to the 
very entrance, across which a constable had placed his staff, 
which he raised only to permit egress. “You may as well 
be off,” he said gruffiy to Philosc. 

“We are strangers,” urged Alethitheras. 

“ Can’t help that, sir,” answered the man : “ keep back.” 

“ But it is only for a few moments,” rejoined Alethi, slip- 
ping a bit of gold into the huge paw of the Cerberus. 

“ Ah, that alters the case,” he answered ; and the bar was 
lifted instantly. Then desiring a fellow-servant to take his 
place, the officer proceeded to force a way for our travelers. 
Without hesitation he tapped with his staff the bald crown 
of an elderly man who had his back to them. Alethi felt 
his generous blood roused by this brutality, and he was about 
to retire in disgust, but Philoscommon whispered, “ Never 
mind, their scalps are used to it.” Finally, the man by great 
efforts, and not without lowering looks from those they dis- 
placed, effected a passage for the two travelers till they 
reached the middle of the hall. A tall man there put him- 


12 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


self determinedly against further inroad. “They are rela- 
tives,” said the officer. “ I don’t believe a word of it,” said the 
man; “and if they were, they are too late.” — “Better late 
than never,” replied the officer. “ Gentlemen, this is about as 
well as you can be placed ; and as it is only for a few minutes, 
and you are so deeply interested, no civil person can object.” 
And he retreated. The crowd, which had sullenly given 
way, eagerly closed up. 

Aletliitheras could both see and hear, but Pliiloscommon 
could only hear. 

“ Shall I put you on my head ?” said the tall obstinate man, 
looking down disdainfully on the little obtruder. 

“ If you please,” retorted Philosc. “ So will your skull 
hold more brains than it ever did before.” 

A general smile at the expense of the tall man put the 
circle around them into harmony with the intruders, who 
now gave their attention to the orator. He was just con- 
cluding for the defendant, who, he argued, in a strain of 
fervid eloquence to which the prestige of his great name 
gave tenfold effect, had but exercised a natural and prescrip- 
tive right, urging (though there was no real similarity in the 
two cases) that an acquittal would inevitably attend the 
injured husband who finding a strange man with his wife 
should put them both to death. A storm of applause fol- 
lowed the appeal. The judge, vindicating the dignity of the 
bench, commanded silence. Thereupon a voice, — it was 
that of the tall man before Philoscommon, — cried out, “We 
do homage to talent.” The advocate gracefully laid his 
hand on his left breast, and in tones which he made to quiver 
as with emotion, rejoined with energy, “It is not my talent 
that has pleaded, it is my heart ! ” At this the storm became 
a perfect hurricane, fortunately perhaps for our travelers, foi 
Aletliitheras had forgot himself so far as to hiss. Philos- 
common, stopping him in the act and whispering “ Are you 
mad ? ” drew him away by the sleeve, and, threading a pas- 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


13 


sage through the billowy crowd, never stopped till he had 
reached the porch. 

“ You had like to bring our travels to a sudden stop,” he 
said. “ Do you know what the punishment for such contempt 
of court w r ould be ? ” 

“ I was wrong, I avow,” replied the other; “but I could 
not keep my temper, to hear a man of sense and of character 
utter such a fustian falsehood.” 

“ It was not a falsehood,” rejoined Philosc ; “it was a 
stroke of eloquence.” 

“ Heaven defend me then from ever making such ! ” ex- 
claimed his friend. 

“ Amen ! But you never will be an orator. And there are 
none in Medamou.” 

They were now in the carriage again. “ But you don’t 
mean to deny the lawlessness of the act ? ” resumed Alethi. 

“ Not if it were a woman that was killed ; but as it was 
only a man, I do.” 

“ How can the law make distinction ? ” 

“But the law does, — in Pantachou; for the popular sen- 
timent will have it so. Would you kick against .the pricks? 
as Jesousians say. Here, between a man and a woman, the 
right is* always on the woman’s side. Men of sense know 
there is rarely ever such a thing as systematic seduction on 
the part of the man : he is drawn in by the allurements of 
the woman, w T ho is seldom sincere, yet falls a victim to her 
own snares ; or she shares the ruin, but has all the pity.”— 

“Except from her own sex,” — put in Alethi. 

“ Who never like their weak points to be exposed, or who 
grudge her the experience,” resumed Philosc, with a double 
twist of his proboscis. “ However, the law is always down 
upon the man, be he victim or sacrificer, and in no case 
can you bring a petticoat to justice. It is not long since, in 
this very city, a woman and a priest poisoned a servant, who 
had detected their intercourse. The husband of the mur- 


14 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


cleress, though she alone had access to the key of his medi- 
cine-chest, whence it was proved by measurement the arsenic 
had been taken, led her to the trial on his arm. The priest 
was sent to the galleys — his gown availing him in mitiga- 
tion of his punishment ; but the woman, who had actually 
fed the servant with the poisoned broth, was acquitted.” 

“ It is a premium on feminine iniquity,” cried Aletlii, in- 
dignant. 

“ It is a compliment to our mothers,” returned Philoscom- 
mon gravely. “ What ! would you deprive the ladies ot 
their chief charm ? Are we not all gainers by that treachery 
and duplicity which impunity encourages ? They add a 
zest to our intercourse with them which downright integrity 
could not furnish.” 

“ And how think you will the present trial result ? ” 

‘ In the acquittal of the party undoubtedly ; or else in 
her amercement in a trifling indemnity to the family of the 
victim. Did you not hear the thunder of applause ? ” 

“ And has the will of an audience influence over a judge ? ” 

“In a degree ; and always over a jury, who are their fel- 
lows. Nowhere but in the semi-barbarous portions of Pan- 
tachou, where there is the rule of autocracy, can the voice 
of the people be without an overpowering weight in the de- 
cisions of justice. He who swims against the tide only ex- 
hausts himself and is borne down just the same, whereas he 
might have swum with it at his ease, and to his advantage.” 

“ Ah, in Medamou no advocate dares appeal to the passions 
of the jury, or address himself indirectly to the audience, 
nor can he in any case do more for the defence than clearly 
to set in view the points of evidence in its favor.” 

“ Because the jury there is never chosen for its ignorance, 
and the judge is confined to a restatement and summing-up 
y of the evidence.” 

“ But are all the lawyers in Chiliopolis like this advocate ? ” 

“ Yery few indeed. For Leptologos is a man of honor 


OP ALETHITHEKAS. 


15 


as well as eloquent. He really may liave spoken from 
liis lieart — or from his imagination ( they are hard to dis- 
tinguish). The rest live by straining at gnats and making 
their clients swallow camels. They rarely stand on their 
heads themselves, but their chief delight is in making others 
do so.” 

“ And the physicians ? ” 

“ Get sick, and send for one ; and you shall see. He feels 
your pulse, looks at your tongue, puts one or two questions, 
writes hurriedly a prescription, pockets his fee, and is gone, 
to visit, for a like five minutes, some other invalid, for whom 
he prescribes with like precipitation. How can he consider 
one case, when he has the diagnostics of several all jumbled 
in his brain ? So he gives no thought to any, and his great 
use is to specify to the sufferer the complaint which he can- 
not cure.” 

“Yet the science, what a noble one ! how calculated to 
enlarge the mind ! ” 

“ Most true ; but its professors are with very few exceptions 
mere tradesmen, and these few deplore the almost utter ina- 
bility of all their art to do more than watch and help a little 
Nature, who alone cures, although alone she does not always 
kill.” 

“ And the divines ? ” 

“Divines truly, were they what their solemn function 
would make them. But divinity is of God, and its teachers 
are of the world. Pomp and vanity, avarice and heartless- 
ness, malice and uncharitableness, all the appetites and pas- 
sions which, earned to excess, mar the well-being of other 
individuals, disfigure them. They are drones in the pulpit, 
drones in the sanctuary, and only workers in ambition, glut- 
tony, and polemics. No, the three professions live only by 
men’s vices, follies, and weakness. Were man but upright 
he would need no mediator between himself and his Creator, 
were he honest lawyers would be needless, and did not his 


16 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


follies and vices beget, the diseases which his follies and his 
weakness perpetuate, the doctor would be something else 
than the mere expounder of a science which except for lore 
is almost absolutely inert.” 

The coach moved slowly on. Alethitheras was silent and 
appeared sad ; but Philoscommon, who even when talking 
seriously could never look quite grave, now resumed all his 
jolly oddity of mien, and kept turning his ugly visage first 
to one window then to the other with great animation, seem- 
ing always to find out somebody or something that he knew 
either from study or from personal experience. At length 
his companion exclaimed : “ Here is a hosier’s. I shall want 
a pair or two of gloves.” 

“ Let us get out then by all means,” said Philoscommon. 
“ You shall see how conducive trade is to integrity ; and as 
for its effect on manners, like education, ‘ emollit mores, nec 
sinit esse feros,’ — you will find it a capital glove-stretcher.” 

The hosier was gravely civil to Alethi, but took no notice 
of Philoscommon. The former selected a couple of pairs ot 
the best gloves, and was about to direct them to be put up, 
when Philoscommon observed that they were spotted. The 
seller turned sharply to the little man, and bade him let the 
gentleman choose for himself. “ The gentleman is my mas- 
ter,” said Philoscommon mischievously. Alethi was rather 
discomposed by the assertion, which however redoubled the 
shopkeeper’s civility. Apologizing as for an oversight, he 
now brought forward a better box, and the traveler substi- 
tuted two other pairs for the ones rejected. The gloves 
rolled up and paid for, the shopkeeper, returning the 
change, desired respectfully to know if he could serve the 
buyer with anything else. “ Yes,” said the latter. “ Come, 
Philos 7 , gratify your fancy.” But ere the pretended servant 
could have time to reply, or the presumed master to offer to 
choose for him, a gentleman entered the shop whose air of 
quiet consequence indicated either the possession of wealth 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


17 


or of acknowledged influence in society. At once the shop- 
keeper ceased to see his transient customers, and, without 
apology turning abruptly from them, made toward the new 
comer with repeated bows and obsequious smiles. Philos- 
common looked delighted, and Alethi in disgust, pocketing 
his little parcel, left instantly the shop. 

“ I think I have seen enough of Chiliopolis, at least for 
to-day,” he said. “ Let us drive at once to the hotel.” 

“ You will find everywhere your betters, save in Meda- 
mou,” quoth Philoscommon, snuffing jip the air with satis- 
faction. “ (As quick as you please, driver.) Everywhere but 
in Medamou, you will find men insolent to their inferiors, 
even when they use them, obsequious to those of their equals 
by whom they hope to profit, and servile to their superiors, 
whether they gain by them or not.” 

“ And is there no such thing as manly independence ? ” 
asked the younger traveler with an expression of mental 
pain. 

“You will one day find something like it among the Iso- 
politeians. But even in them the leaven of foreign adultera- 
tion is working the human dough to a uniform spongy con- 
sistence. — But there is the Coreoplethes.” 

The travelers descended. The luggage was removed, — 
the schoolmaster affecting to carry Alethitheras’ dressing- 
case. The extra-feed coachman, with lifted hat and litany 
scrapes and bows, hoped to be permitted to wait on the gen- 
tleman again whenever he should need a carriage, at which 
Philoscommon’s eyes looked especially facetious, and he ob- 
served to Alethitheras, “ What amiable people are the Chilio- 
politans ! ” And amid a train of shining lackeys, who bowed 
with affected respect to the supposed master and winked to 
each other as they glanced at the man, the pair ascended the 
single broad step of the hotel. Just then a man whose 
frame was bent with years, or suffering, or the abjectness of 
assumed humility, but who carried no staff, held out his hat 


18 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


to Alethitheras. He was partly behind the latter, Ms left 
hand, which shook as with palsy, holding out the greasy and 
rusty head-cover, and his long white hairs falling over his 
down-stooping forehead. 

Alethitheras thought of his grandsire, though there was no 
resemblance, except in years, between him and the beggar, 
and dropped into the hat a small gold coin — an unwonted 
charity, which had a greater effect upon the now sincerely 
reverent lackeys than upon the delighted mendicant. But 
Philoscommon could scarcely support his character for the 
laughter that shook him, though at the moment no one had 
eyes for such an oddity, and he might have indulged himself 
unnoticed. 

When however he was finally alone with his companion, 
the schoolmaster gave way to his mirth, and looking up in 
the latter’s face, asked him where his gloves were. 

“ On my hands.” 

“ The new ones.” 

Alethitheras felt in his pocket, in his pockets. They were 
gone. Philoscommon fairly spun on his heels with ecstacy. 

“ The devil ! ” said Alethitheras. “ Who took them ? ” 

“No, it was not he,” replied Philosc. “It was only 
the venerable old man, who so lovelily prayed God to spare 
your own hairs when gray from every sorrow. Ilis right 
hand just at the moment was dipping into your worship’s 
coat-tail. I would rather have had the scene than the coin.” 
And the schoolmaster gave way again to his delight. 

“ I believe it would amuse you if I were stabbed,” quoth 
Alethitheras, rather put out at his own credulity. 

“No, no, not so bad as that — unless you looked ridicu- 
lous. You know I cannot help it ; I came into the world 
grinning, like Zoroaster. But really that old cock was a 
game oue.” And Philoscommon, putting his droll figure into 
an imitative attitude, held out his traveling-cap, and began 
to fumble at his companion’s rifled pocket. 




OP ALETHITHEE AS. 


19 


Aletlritheras was forced to smile. 

“ But you really saw liim do it ? ” 

“ With both these eyes, and all my heart.” 

“ And why did you not stop him, or at least tell me ? ” 

“ Because the first act would have deprived you of one 
of those good lessons for which I think you travel, and 
the other would have prevented us for a time from traveling 
at all.” 

“ Prevented us from traveling ? What, do they detain the 
robbed as well as the robber ? ” 

“Always in Chiliopolis. And in certain cases when he 
cannot give bail for his appearance against a criminal, they 
send the witness too to jail.” 

“ Monstrous ! ” cried Alethitheras. “ Why don’t they take 
his evidence at once, with every precaution and the due for- 
malities, and let him go ? ” 

“ Because that would not allow the lawyers the privilege 
of cross-questioning him.” 

“ But of what use is that in a palpable case, like this for 
instance ? ” 

“ They gain time by it, show their own adroitness, confuse 
the witness, and bewilder the jury. Did I not say that their 
business was to strain at gnats and make others swallow 
camels ? ” 

“ I almost wish I were once again in Medamou.” 

“ Then you would never see people stand upon their heads,” 
quoth the philosopher. “But let us have dinner — which I 
can promise you will be a rare one, out of respect to your 
bounty. In that gold coin, not to speak of the gloves, you 
threw your bread upon the waters, and you will find it return 
to you at table a thousand fold, — only you will have to pay 
for it. Shall I ring ? ” 

“ If you please,” said Alethitheras. “ But I think it will be 
the last, as the first time, that we eat potatoes in Pantachou.” 

“ Amen ! ” rejoined the little mushroom, looking poisonous. 


20 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ There is a barque, I see, to sail to-morrow for Liburnum.” 
“ And,” he added, continuing to look on a paper which he had 
lifted from a table, “ there are just two berths vacant. There 
will need no consular vise from this port ; so our passports are 
in order, and we shall have only to step on board with bag 
and baggage. The barque is an Isopoliteian ; therefore 
staunch, well-found, and a fast sailer. Shall we go ? ” 

“ With all my heart,” replied Alethitheras. 

“ Then here’s for potage ,” cried the schoolmaster, giving a 
tremendous jerk at the bell. 

“ You’ll break the wire,” said his companion, smiling. 

“ Never mind. People seldom ring feebly, when they are 
not afraid of the reckoning.” And down went the crank 
again. 

“ They will think us vulgar,” said Alethitheras. 

“ Just the contrary. You will find you must make a noise 
in the world, if you would obtain a hearing.” 


CHAPTER III. 

How they sail for Liburnum , are initiated in the mysteries 
of pudding-malting, and arrive at Gebel-al-Tarik. 

Our travelers were accommodated with two berths in a 
little stateroom at the foot of the companion-way, and di- 
rectly opposite the steward’s pantry. In the cabin itself 
were, on the starboard side an Anastesian opera-singer, with 
two children, a boy of seven or eight years and an infant yet 
in the arms, and on the larboard a little freckled Jactantian, 
who had formerly been in the navy and was returning 
to his native land from a visit to Colonia. lie was to be 
landed at Gebel-al-Tarik. The captain of the vessel was a 
Cimbric-Cherronensian, a man of talent and information, a 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


21 


thorough sailor, an ardent admirer of his adopted home in 
Isopoliteia, and a bitter hater of the Philautians. The Jac- 
tantian was a little proud and a great deal nasty ; though 
his pri de was palpable only towards the end of the voyage, 
while his nastiness was from the first uncomfortably conspic- 
uous. Philoscommon undertook to teach him certain con- 
ventional phrases in the Philautian tongue, and was rewarded 
to his heart’s content when he heard him on one or two 
mornings roar out from between his curtains at the pitch of 
his unmelodious voice for something he needed, naming it 
in Philautian without tenderness and without regard to the 
feminine ears which must have heard him behind the close- 
drawn muslin of the crib to starboard. But Alethitheras 
conceived great contempt for him when he heard him speak 
disparagingly of the captain, a man in every respect very 
greatly his superior, and boast one day, after partaking freely 
of the captain’s segars and wine, that he “ made use of him.” 
And this contempt was not diminished when on another 
occasion, in discoursing on religion, the Jactantian touched 
his little sunburned forehead with his yellow finger and 
uttered expressively in his native tongue the word “ philoso- 
pher,” applying it to himself. 

“ It is a wonder,” said Alethi, soon after, when alone with 
Philoscommon, “that such fellows do not bring infidelity 
into contempt.” 

“ They would,” said Philos', “ if all free-thinkers were like 
them ; but, unhappily for religion, such fellows are no more 
real infidels than they are philosophers. They are born with- 
out veneration, and have no conception of anything above 
the sphere of their own sensuality. They catch at the term 
philosopher as at a very fine ornament ; but it is no more 
applicable than misanthrope would be to you, or beauty to 
me.” The air which he assumed in pronouncing the last 
illustration was such as to do away with all the seriousness 
of the theme, and to bring the subject himself across the deck, 


23 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


who asked in great glee, what Philoscommon was doing that 
he made himself so angelical. 

“ Painting false philosophy,” replied the latter. 

“And what do you make her?” asked the unconscious 
Jactantian. 

“ Something between an ape and an infidel,” said Philos- 
common unhesitatingly, — “or, if you like, as a harlot, who 
with wanton gestures and lascivious looks affects the talk of 
chastity.” 

* “ That is just like the women of my country,” said the 

Jactantian. “ They are only of two kinds; those that are 
bad ” ( but he used a broader phrase,) “ and those who affect 
to be not so.” 

“ He is more a philosopher than I thought him,” remarked 
Philoscommon to his companion, in their own tongue, as 
they turned away. 

One morning, when they had been about a week at sea, 
and the baker’s-bread had become scanty as well as stale, 
Alethitlieras, who occupied the upper berth in the narrow 
stateroom, felt his mattress pushed upward, and looking over 
the side of his box, saw his room-mate stretch forward from 
his own berth, and, the moment he was noticed, point with 
great energy and an air of amusement to the pantry opposite. 
Alethi looked, and to his horror saw the steward in his shirt- 
tail, and evidently unwashed, making bread for breakfast. 
That day, and the next, and the next, Alethitlieras ate hard 
biscuit. 

“Pslia ! ” said his companion, “you are too dainty. You 
will get used to these things. You see, I don’t mind it. 
And the bread is excellent — for ship-made.” 

On the fourth day after the discovery, there was a flour 
pudding after dinner, and Alethi, who had borne his depriva- 
tion ill, ate of it with great relish ; but Philoscommon would 
not touch it. The captain left the three gentlemen to the 
usual dessert of dried fruits, and went on deck. 


OF ALETHITHER AS. 


28 


“ Why did yon refuse the pudding ? ” asked Alethi : “ I 
know you like such things ; and this was delicate.” 

“ So I should think,” observed Philos' ; “ rather infantile.” 

“ What do you mean? ” returned the other. 

“ Ask Madame,” said Philosc, indicating the Signora, who 
as usual lay in her open berth, a hors-d'oeuvre that added much 
to the pleasures of the table. 

Here Madame, thus appealed to, rose on her elbow, and 
with a very red face exclaimed in her broken Philautian, 

“ That beast of a cook ! he take my shile’s clout to boil it • 
in.” 

“ Stoo-ard' ! ” roared the little Jactantian, “ show us the 
booding-bag.” 

“ Pll show him,” said Madame, proceeding to take up her 
infant. 

“ With the pudding in it,” cried Philoscommon. 

“ But that is a dry one,” rejoined the ex-navy-officer, who 
seemed to relish the joke. 

Alethitheras did not wait for the close, or the opening of 
the exhibition, and Philoscommon followed him, leaving the 
Jactantian quite at ease among the raisins. 

“ How could you let me eat of that thing ? ” asked Alethi, 
reproachfully. 

“ It had been a pity to spoil your appetite,” replied the 
schoolmaster. “It was so long too since you had tasted 
pastry. Besides, you must get used to these things, or you’ll 
starve.” 

“ But you do not, or what kept you from the dainty ? ” 

“ A bad example. You saw the bread made, and I heard 
of the pudding-boiling. It is of that sort of things ‘ where 
ignorance is bliss.’ ” 

“ But what did you hear ? Come now, Philos', say it is all 
a joke.” 

“ And libel Madame ! No, it is really true. Come, don’t 
get sick yet ; the sea is not so rough. I was in our room, 


24 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


when I heard Madame in a furious mood scolding the steward 
for appropriating her property. It seems her maid had set 
the cloths to soak in a bucket, and the Doctor, that’s the 

cook, finding them convenient ” Alethi w T ould not let 

him finish. 

Such pleasing incidents, with the occasional escape from 
the hencoop of some unhappy fowl, which would be seen 
floating away on the billow, destined perhaps to long suffer- 
ing and a lingering death, — “ an illustration,” the school- 
• master took care to remark, “ of the chances that govern this 
mortal life both for men and chickens,” — or the upsetting 
of the “Doctor” with a pannier of plates, or the attempt to 
catch a turtle, helped to vary the monotony of their daily 
life ; for the voyage was without a storm. 

One evening, w T hen they were within a few days of their 
first destination, Alethitheras and his friend ou descending 
to the cabin found the captain intent upon a paper, while 
the Jactantian, with an air of manifest importance, watched 
his countenance. “ So w^e have a great man among us,” cried 
the former to our travelers. “ The Signor Piojoso, it seems, 
carries two passports, and is here a Marquis : Marques de 
Capricho Real” 

“ You have an example of the utility of such papers,” said 
Philoscommon to his companion, when they had returned to 
the deck. 

“ Of their futility you mean,” replied Alethi. 

“ As you like,” rejoined the schoolmaster. “ If our friend 
the Marquis can play the Signor Piojoso, there is nothing to 
prevent untitled but more important persons’ traveling in- 
cog. : and we have seen in our time a famous political refugee 
pass undetected the frontiers of a dozen countries that were 
all eager to arrest him. I myself had the fortune, by a mere 
oversight, to travel for a twelvemonth as a Pliilautian, and 
only once came within the shadow of a difficulty, when hav- 
ing carelessly mentioned my origin in a stagecoach, it came 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


25 


through one of the passengers to the ears of a frontier 
guardsman, who, putting his finger on the word in my cre- 
dentials which denoted my supposed nationality, asked if it 
was I. ‘ To be sure,’ I said ; ‘ who the devil should it be, if 
not I ? ’ He turned round to the other travelers who were in 
the same room waiting supper. There was general though 
faint surprise. They all thought me a liar ; either way or 
the other I did not care ; and the armed policeman was sat- 
isfied.” 

From that time the Jactantian assumed more dignity and * 
reserve of manner, relaxing only towards our traveler and his 
friend, but especially toward the former. He dressed him- 
self too with more particularity, and appeared altogether a 
different sort of person. 

“ I wonder,” said Alcthitheras, commenting on this change, 

“ whether he is really so much improved, or if it be only my 
consciousness of his position in society that makes him seem 
to me so much the gentleman.” 

“Neither, I think. It is probably his consciousness of 
your knowing his true position, which forces him to act up 
to it. But his true nature delights in nastiness, and you will 
find it breaking through this crust of decency before long, or 
I cannot tell puff-paste from biscuit.” 

In a few days they arrived in the bay of Tarik, where the 
Marquis was to land. A number of row-boats were floating 
lazily about, some their oars suspended and rocking only 
with the motion of the wave. Alethitheras was struck by 
the appearance of several swarthy well-built fellows, who, 
wrapped in brown mantles the skirt of which was thrown 
majestically over the left shoulder, and with broad-leafed felt 
hats around whose conical crowns were wreathed rows of 
ribbon, the long loose ends flaunting like streamers in the 
breeze, sat in the boats as passengers and gazed upon the 
vessel. Presently one of the oarsmen made a gesture with 
his arm bent, and said something in his native tongue to 
2 


26 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


tlieir countryman the Marquis, who immediately replied. 
Philoscommon, with a peculiar expression in his face, turned 
briskly to Alethitheras. 

“ What are these ? ” asked the latter. 

“ Smugglers,” quoth Philosc. 

“ What ! openly ? in broad day ? ” 

“ O, do you not see the Philautian flag floating from the 
fortress? You heard our captain curse it a minute since, 
when he was obliged to hoist his own. The Philautians 
many years since burned the island capital of his country 
and took away forcibly its whole fleet, on the pretext the 
Alectryons might get it, with whom the Philautians were 
then at war.” 

“ It was an insolent act,” interposed Alethitheras. 

“ It was a demonstration of the right of nature, which is 
the right of the strongest. And here is another. Philautia 
holds that powerful fortress and this harbor of an independ- 
ent kingdom with which it professes to be friends ; and it 
will ever hold them, because that mountain fort commands 
the entrance to the great Internal Sea we now are in. The 
jaunty fellows you behold are protected by her in their vio- 
lation of the custom-laws of their own country, and it is 
under her flag that they rob Jactantia, their helpless and 
all but impoverished mother, of her dues.” 

“ What an abomination ! I begin already to hate that arro- 
gant and unscrupulous power.” 

“ Philautia ? O, you will have some cause perhaps, before 
we have seen all. But for the present let me tell you, that 
she does everywhere the same ; a staunch maintainer of the 
law and boaster of equity, when the observation of either 
is to her interest, or safety, but boldly setting both aside 
when it suits her convenience. If you will allow me tc 
spoil the prosody I used to enforce upon the glutei muscles 
of the little Medamousians, I would parody in her behalf 
defunct Anchises : 


OF ALETflITHERAS. 


27 


* Tu regere imperio populos, Pkilaute, memento : 

Hae tibi erant artes, — pacisqae imponere moiera, 

Parcere superbis et debeUare dejecios.' ” 

“But wliy do other nations that are strong permit a usur- 
pation that may at any time be dangerous for themselves ? ” 

“ Because they themselves, if not so frequently, yet on oc- 
casion, practice just the like. Turn your face to Abyla on 
the other side of the Straits. There, in that vast peninsula, 
at this moment the Alectryons are trampling under foot the 
natural rights of a people, whose weakness might be said to 
be the pretext as it is the temptation to the wrong.” 

“ But surely there are laws that regulate the policy of na- 
tions with respect to one another ? ” 

“ I have heard of them. But I never knew them to be 
observed, except perhaps by the Isopoliteians. But they 
are noci homines, a new nation, and may think themse’vej 
obliged to observe the equity which older governments may 
set at nought. Besides, their government is founded profess- 
edly on principles of equal right.” 

“ How I shall like them 1 ” 

“I am not so sure of that. Wait till you see them. Older 
nations look on them as semi-civilized, and treat them very 
much as if they were in pupilage and would be too grateful 
for any notice to inquire if it were insulting.” 

“ And wdiat say the Isopoliteians ? ” 

“ They seem to take it as a thing of course. So long as 
they are not driven over, my lord’s carriage may fling the 
dust or mud into their faces at his will. So, the wheels roll 
on unheeded ; for the Isopoliteian State is powerful : that is 
one of its war- vessels yonder. Were a dozen such defending 
yon coast, the Alectryons could not boast of roasting or of 
smoking men alive.” 

“What?” 

“It is a literal fact. A number of the natives, with their 
wives I think and children, had taken to a cave. They 


28 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


would not leave it and surrender. Poor devils, tliey were 
fighting for their homes, their gods, their freedom. What 
business had they to stand upon a trifle like submission, 
because they were brave men ? So the captain of the Alec- 
tryons stopped up the cavern’s mouth with stones, and heap- 
ing brushwood at it set fire thereto ; and not a man came out 
alive ! ” 

“You sicken me.” 

“ If such facts do, we had better end our journeying here. 
But you will get used to it. And now, after the tragedy, let 
the curtain rise to farce. Do you know why I looked at you 
when the Jactantian answered that gesticulation and taunt 
of his countrymen ? Bend down your ear.” 

Alethitheras did so, and drew back in amazement, in dis- 
gust. 

“It is true,” said Philoscommon ; “those were the very 
words. And our Marquis could answer in his own style the 
fellow whose fingers he would not deign to touch. I told 
you that his crust of decency was only puff-paste.” 

“ Horrible manners ! I would we were rid of him.” 

“ To your wish.” 

The little Jactantian’s luggage was already in one of the 
boats. He stepped forward now, and bidding cordially 
goodbye to our travelers, or rather to Alethi, without 
saying he should be happy to see him in his home and with- 
out so much as noticing the captain whose wine and segars 
he had made such use of, his little weazen face disappeared 
over the ship’s bulwarks. 


OF ALETIIITIIERAS. 


29 


CHAPTER IV. 

They go up Tank's Mountain , and are rewarded by free 
lodgings in Quarantine , where both get bitten , and Aletlii 
pleasurably. 

The Captain proposing to our travelers to visit the For- 
tress, the three went ashore together, and under guidance of 
one of the garrison ascended the height. There, in kennels 
of the solid rock, couched the huge war-dogs whose grim 
muzzles yawned threateningly on the channel below. The 
fortress seemed impregnable, if any such can be to resolute 
and persevering men ; and Alethitheras descended into the 
warm sunshine on the shadeless road with a strong impres- 
sion of the power of that great, arrogant, and unscrupulous 
nation whose insular home he meant one day to visit. 

That evening, leaning on the rail, as the vessel glided 
gently yet rapidly by the heights of Nadagar, whose roman- 
tic loveliness in the purple twilight filled our traveler’s soul 
with delicious softness, Alethitheras pondered with fuller in- 
telligence the story of the effeminate Maurusian king, who, 
loitering a fugitive on the spot which still is known as his 
“ Last Siglif wept like a woman for what he could not defend 
like a man. 

The next day, they passed in sight the island of Cyrnos, 
where of old the savage people fed on honey that was bitter 
in the mouth, and from whose mountain nest in later times 
soared the eagle whose portentous wings shadowed half the 


30 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


earth, and the next day’s sun glared dazzling on their white 
reefed topsails in the harbor of Libumum. 

Scarcely were they anchored, when a man came on board 
from a boat with a yellow flag, and conferred some minutes 
with the master, then returned to the shore. Thereupon, the 
latter with a grim smile informed his passengers they were 
in quarantine for fifteen days ; ten for their port of depart- 
ure, and five for stopping not so many hours a*t Gebel-al- 
Tarik. 

“ But we have a clean bill of health,” said Alethi ; “ and 
we left in mid-winter.” 

“ Ay, but we have sugar on board, and the boxes are 
strapped with hides.” 

“ This is excellent ! ” cried Philoscommon, in great glee. 
“ And what do we carry in our ow T n hides from Gebel-al- 
Tarik ? We found no sugar on the hill-side, and we caught 
^ no smallpox from the breeches of the cannon.” 

“ No, but we passed through a street of the town and 
stopped ten minutes at the consul’s office,” said the skipper, 
with another smile. 

“ Nothing more then can be said,” replied Pliilosc, with 
gravity. “ Such wisdom establishes the mathematical para- 
dox, that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. 
Let us profit by it. When next we cross the seas, we will 
call for the manifest of the cargo before we take passage, 
and if w T e must have our haven a place of torment we will 
eschew all purgatories by the way.” 

“ That is a sorry jest,” said Alethi theras. 

“ No, it is a gay one. They laugh wiio win. If fever 
should break out in the Lazaret w T e may get wiia*t we did 
not bring.” 

“You are consolatory,” said his companion, not over- 
pleased. 

“No, I am monitory. Forewarned is forearmed, they 
say. ’Tis the wisdom of pratique, and the practice of quar- 


OF ALETHITUERAS. 


31 


antine. But suppose the skipper board us, we need not go 
to the Lazaret.” 

The Captain proved refractory, even to a tempting offer ; 
and Alethitheras, disgusted with his disobligingness, did 
not strive to persuade him. The barque came to the quar- 
antine wharf. There a handsome young fellow of the coun- 
try offered himself as servant to be shut up with our travel- 
ers, and as Philoscommon could not deny the advantage of 
securing him, he was gladly engaged at so much a day, and 
put himself at once and zealously, and as if he were used to 
it, to the work. So our travelers with their man, and the 
opera-singer with her children, were ferried on and across 
a greenish-yellow ditch, a gate opened in the hospital wall, 
and they were at once in their prison. 

It was a large quadrangle, almost completely shut in by 
rows of stone houses having wide arched openings on the 
ground floor, arid narrow straight doorways leading by stone 
steps to the single story above, which was floored with 
bricks and totally unfurnished. But the lodging was rent- 
free, as Philoscommon advised his friend with an affected 
air of much satisfaction. 

“ So let us choose the grandest,” he added. “ And here 
is one with rooms on both sides. What a particularly re- 
freshing atmosphere ! ” It was like a vault. 

11 We shall mold here,” said Alethi, looking already as if 
Lie were about to suffer the incrustation. 

“ Or live like toads in stone,” rejoined his consoler ; “ for, 
like them, as we are in by accident so we shall get out with- 
out our will. But come, you shall see how comfortable we 
can be even under St. Lazarus. So, my man with the velvet 
jacket What is your name ? ” 

“ Pais, gentlemen,” answered the handsome Anastesian. 

“ So, get us quickly here fire and everything that is need- 
ful and comfortable. — We must be generous,” he added in 
their own tongue to his companion, “ since the sanitary 


32 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


powers oblige us with these handsome chambers without 
other cost than compelling us to live in them.” 

A fire of faggots was soon crackling on the hearth, and 
they had scarcely finished their ablutions and changed their 
clothes before Pais brought in a well-cooked and neatly 
served supper, in which a kind of boiled paste looking like 
clay pipe-stems and dressed with butter and grated cheese 
played a conspicuous and acceptable part, and a large flask 
of a sweetish purple wine stopped with a plug of cotton 
wool smeared with oil at the inner end. 

When the repast was over, whereat the philosopher seeing 
Alethi’s cheerfulness took occasion to remark how much 
good eating has to do with a pleasant temper, Velvet- Jacket 
took down to the ground floor for his own consumption the 
ample remains of the eatables and the greatest part of the 
flask of cloying wine, lighted a curious four-branched brazen 
lamp, and left, at Alethi’s order, for the night. 

“ That bottle will go back empty to-morrow,” said Philosc, 
“ and stopperless too ; for they who smoke your passport 
with sulphur, as they are sure to do, will hardly let that bit 
of cotton go from you outside. It is a precautionary wis- 
dom in which the Anastesians surpass the rest of the world, 
and it is one reason of their commercial prosperity. When 
we get back to Medamou, I intend to advise the coating of 
all new-come foreigners with pitch, and to force them to 
conduct their inspiration and expiration through a stove- 
pipe, set always to leeward, for forty days. Thus you see 
we shall not have lived here in vain.” 

The next morning the schoolmaster, completely dressed, 
came from his own room into Alethi’s, which served them 
for parlor. 

“ How did you pass the night ? ” he asked, with a very 
pathetic look. 

“ Like one of the damned,” replied Alethi. “ Why, could 
you sleep ? ” 


OP ALETHITHEEAS. 33 

Philoscommon rubbed his back, and, first giving vent to a 
roar of laughter, replied : 

“ A.Ko?i?i,vfiai deiXaiog" ek tov CKtpnodog 
Aanvovoc fjH egepTrovreg oi Kopivdioi , 

Kat rag nXevpag dapdanrovaiv , 

K ai tt)v ipvxv v eiarivovoiv, 

Kai aheml 

* * * 

K ai p' aTroAouffiv.” 

“ Look there ! ” exclaimed Alethi tragically, lifting with 
somewhat fastidious fingers his night-shirt and showing in 
every plait in the neck either a flea or the marks of one. 

“ Why that is nothing,” returned Philos. “ The pretty 
creatures. There is enough of them in Anastasia to carry 
away the house, if they only got under the rafters instead of 
our ribs. But what are you gazing at ? ” he added, as Ale- 
thitheras, holding still the tragic garment by the collar, 
looked out at the window with all his eyes. “ Per Venerem ! 
you are bitten now, I think ; but it is by another sort of 
insect,” as he saw the object of attraction. 

The court of the Lazaret was coated with a smooth crust 
of asphaltum and sand, which sloped from every side toward 
the centre, that the rains might flow into the cistern under it 
by certain openings made near a pump, cased rather hand- 
somely in marble, the openings giving admission also to the 
overflow of all the water-jugs which were filled at the pump 
as well as the drippings of the spout itself. This pump was 
directly opposite our travelers’ w T indow T s. Beyond it diago- 
nally was a break in the rows of houses, wiiere the ditch 
might be seen, and certain sheds, and the country beyond. 
To the right of this opening and within the court was an 
angular building windowed all around and from top to bot- 
tom, not big enough for a chapel nor open enough for a 
summer-house. Within this again, commenced the row 
2 * 


34 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


wliicli stood at right angles with that where our travelers 
were lodged, and at its very extremity, where it abutted on 
this last row, yawned the gate which had given admittance 
to these reluctant tenants. When its valves were closed be- 
hind them, Alctlii, looking around, had seen over the gate the 
faces, singularly handsome, of several very dark men, whose 
heads were covered with flat turbans. These men were now 
assembled in the court, enjoying the February sun. By their 
costume they were Maurusians ; and the quality of the stuff 
and the mien of the bearers showed they were but ordinary 
persons. Two other men whose faces he had not before seen 
were standing together beyond the pump and near the glass 
building. A young girl was near them, dressed also as a 
Maurusian, wearing her girdle as in her country virgins wear 
it, but having on her head no vail. She was as singularly 
handsome even for a woman as the first-named group were 
for men. Her complexion was something like in tint an 
apricot, with a redder spot in the cheeks like the sun-kissed 
portion of the fruit. Her mouth, beautifully formed, but 
rather sad, harmonized in expression with large, long, pen- 
sive eyes of a black like velvet, and the oval of her visage 
added to the beauty of the fine straight nose, whose faultless 
outlines gave in turn new elegance to it. Philoscommon 
saw in an instant that the girl was not yet aware of his com- 
panion’s observation. But, as he turned to watch the effect 
of her beauty upon the latter, Alethi, with a flush over all 
his face, dropped the shirt, seized his hat and darted dowu 
stairs. Philoscommon anxiously followed. 

The girl was no longer visible, but the two men that had 
been near her were holding-to by the knob the furthest door 
of one of the houses, and laughing heartily. Alethitheras 
went directly to the door, when they let it go, retreating with 
a kind of deference. Out came the maiden from the house, 
looked at the traveler, dropped her eyes with a faint blush, 
and disappeared in the house adjoining. 


OF ALETHITIIEEAS. 


85 


“ What are you about ? ” said Philoscommon. “ Ai’e fifteen 
days not enough for you in this prison ? ” 

“ What right had those fools to shut the girl up ? ” 

“It is well they do not understand you, or they might 
answer you, for all the deference they seem to pay to what 
they suppose your better rank, that the girl was their com- 
panion and not yours, and bid you mind your own busi- 
ness.” 

“ In fact, I was wrong,” said Alethi, a little abashed. But 
he looked aside at the door where the girl had disappeared, 
then up at the windows of her lodging, as if the admission 
were not very sincere. 

“ That is frankly said,” returned Philosc, “ though I wish 
you laid it more to heart than you seem to do. Do you 
know the laws of this place ? Had those men not receded 
from you, or had you touched the girl, you would have had 
the difference in their time for pratique added to your own. 
You do not seem to think it would have mattered. But 
perhaps those men were wiser, and backed from you out 
of fear for themselves, more than from deference as I first 
thought.” 

Alethi let him talk ; and the ugly little Mentor, seeing how 
it was with the former, drew his shoulders for a moment 
nearer to his monstrous head, and followed him more gravely 
than usual back to their lodgings, the handsome Maurusian 
men looking on all the wiiile with as much surprise as their 
smooth and passionless features seemed to be capable of ex- 
pressing. But they said nothing to one another. 


3G 


TRAVELS BY SEA AKD LAND 


CHAPTER V. 

Alethitlieras finds the insect that bit him , but fails to catch it. 

They climb the toicer at Glinepurgos , and meet on top a 

nondescript. 

The monotony of quarantine continued unbroken. The 
eating was still good on both sides, the fleas and the travel- 
ers. In the way of sleeping, the former continued to have 
the best of it, for they did theirs by day. But if misery 
makes one acquainted with strange bedfellows, habit makes 
us indifferent to their company, said Philoscommon, declar- 
ing for his part that his back was so well-flea’d he would be 
able to set it up against even the bugs of Socrates. The 
Maurusians, the males alone, still sunned themselves in the 
court, and, the singing-lady with her children appearing there 
also, Alethitlieras improved the occasion, as well as gratified 
his courteous and benevolent temper, by exercising himself 
in her native tongue in frequent converse with her. If from 
time to time he looked up to the rows of windows on the 
portal side of the hospital, or expected to see a young and 
more graceful form than Madame’s make shine some narrow 
doorway of the lodgings, it was in vain. He had not forgot 
to question Pais adroitly, but gathered nothing from him 
more than the bald fact of his seeing the girl conversing 
through the grating of the Parlor with some visitors from 
the outside who looked to be of the country, but whose mode 
of speech he could not distinguish. Philosc, whom he forgot 
to question, might have told him more ; which was, that on 


OF ALETHITHEKAS, 


37 


a certain day, when lie alone was at tlie open casement, tlie 
maiden had appeared in the court a moment, and looked 
diffidently up to the window, where to his great satisfaction 
and amusement she met a head that might have been to her 
amusement, but was certainly not to her satisfaction, for she 
did not look again, and, when another head appeared, was 
gone. 

One day however, the Captain in his barge appeared in 
the canal or ditch at the opening we have indicated, and 
bowing to our friends in the window they forgot his late 
disobligingness and went out to him. After the interview, 
Velvet- Jacket came to announce visitors. 

“ Visitors ! ” exclaimed Alethi. 

“ Hotel-servants, with cards of their masters’ accommoda- 
tions,” said Philos, turning sharply to Velvet- Jacket. “ They 
have heard we shall soon be out, and take time by the fore- 
* lock.” 

“Let us go, nevertheless,” rejoined Alethi. “I want to 
see the talking-room.” 

Pais led the way to a long gallery opposite the entrance- 
gate. On one side, the right, was a solid wall, on the left a 
partition of iron rails, which served as a barrier between the 
inmates of the Lazaret and their visitors. 

“ And there are our friends,” said Philos. “ Did n’t I tell 
you ? ” 

But Alethi was already pre-occupied, and the visitors 
thrust through the bars their cards in vain. From the fur- 
ther end, where indeed was the door of egress through which 
in five days they would pass to freedom, was seen approach- 
ing rapidly, but with uncertain step and head more than 
once cast down, the Maurusian maiden. Alethi impulsively 
stepped toward her, a movement which a side look from her 
long black eyes and a deep blush which spread all over her 
sunny cheek might well accelerate, but ere the fatal contact, 
from which the girl herself did not seem to shrink, ( perhaps 


38 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

the narrow space did not admit of retreat, ) was arrested by 
Pliiloscommon, who for the second time raised his voice in 
warning. Perhaps it would have been in vain, had not 
Velvet- Jacket himself ventured to remind the gentleman that 
the young lady would have pratique in a day or two, and if 
he touched her she might, for aught he knew, be obliged to 
remain till the end of his own term of confinement. Our 
traveler instantly retreated, w T ith a half inclination of the 
head, which the girl appeared to acknowledge, by bending 
down her own, as, with another sidelong glance, she passed 
with flushed cheek, and not unpleased, into the court. 

“ Are you a candidate for the rite of Canaan ? ” asked 
Philosc. 

“Why?” 

“ That girl is of the Chosen People. At least, the men 
with her are Leipoderms.” 

“ What matter is it ? ” 

“ When one- is stung, if the insect came from the Temple 
or was hatched in the rug of a mosque ? None whatever. 
Only, if I must be bitten, I would not let that fellow see me 
scratch.” 

“ You are wonderfully nice of a sudden.” 

“No, by Pollux, not for myself but you. For me, like 
Diogenes, all the world might see my amours and welcome. 
Only I think they would be in doubts whether I was not 
pretending,” added the toothless mouth, assuming at the 
same time a look of voluptuousness so unsurpassably ugly, 
that Alethi lost the displeasure of his disappointment in 
mirth, and only ceased smiling when he saw the girl, whose 
retreating figure he had followed with his eyes, turn half 
round as she entered the door of her lodging, and dart from 
the intense blackness of her own orbs a flash as sudden, as 
rapid, as vivid, and in one sense as fatal, as lightning. 

“ That was a Parthian arrow,” said the schoolmaster, as he 
saw where the bolt had entered. 


OF ALETIIITHEItAS. 


39 


They saw no more of her. The fifth day came, and after 
breakfast Pais re-entered with a small quarto parchment- 
covered book in his hand. Looking particularly amiable, as 
he spread it before Alethi, he hoped the two gentlemen 
would add their recommendation of his services to the many 
that were already there written. 

“ Not I,” said Alethi to Philosc in their own tongue. “ I 
know nothing about him.” 

“ I do,” said the philosopher. “ Give it to me.” Dipping 
a pen slowly in the inkstand, as if to give him time for 
thought, he wrote as follows : 

“ Would you a caterer ? Pais is to your wish ; 

He’ll eat for two, and drink like any fish. 

A chamberlain ? N one better for your ease, 

To shake your bed, or stock it full of fleas.” 

Velvet- Jacket saw the expression in Aletlii’s face, as he 
turned with silent reproach to Philoscommon, and looked 
distrustful. 

“ I see,” said the latter, as if replying to his friend’s reproof, 
“you think I have not said enough. Here then.” 

He took the pen again, and turning his proboscis upward 
for a moment, — a delightful movement which suggested to 
Alethitheras the pangs of parturition, and made the valet 
almost forget their presence, he brought into the light this 
additional birth : 

“ Take him howe’er, aud bless your happy lot ; 

He ’s handsome, — which St. Lazarus is not.” 

Without waiting for comment, he signed it “Phil, and 
Al.” 

“ No,” said Alethi resolutely. 

Philosc erased the “ and,” and wrote over it “ for.” 

“ Nor that.” 

“ O ! my master objects,” said Philoscommon, turning to 
the astonished servant, “ that I have only given my own 


40 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


name. There, you have now both of us.” And he wrote, 
instead of “ for,” “ not.” 

“ Master ! ” exclaimed at last the Velvet- Jacket. “ I thought 
the gentlemen were friends, and had hoped they would employ 
me further.” 

“ You see we shall not need you,” said Alethi, giving some- 
thing additional to the stipulated wages, while he looked 
again reproachfully at Philosc, but this time on another ac- 
count than the epigram. 

“ And with that recommendation to boot, you are better 
paid, my friend, than I think you have ever been before. 
Set on. A long good bye to Lazarus ; but not to fleas, nor 
yet to fleecing.” 

It being a Saturday when they made egress from the Laz- 
aret into the town, Alethitheras was seized with a desire to 
see the Leipodermian meeting-house. His companion said 
it was a preparation for the rite, and on the way dilated on 
the operation, which he described in every detail, the knife, 
the notched plate, the sand-cup and the styptic-vase, declared 
he would swallow a full mouthful of the ensanguined wine, 
and supplicated to be made the operator, that he might have 
a remnant of his friend to take with him into his own coffin ; 
all of which particulars, with certain unctuous prolusions on 
the adaptation of the rite to females, and the use of the 
grammatical figure of apocope, which, he said, though he 
had often taught it before, he had never had till now an op- 
portunity of realizing in propriis qr'j maribus , seemed to 
afford him great refreshment. You would have thought 
he longed for the performance of the act which was to 
make his friend free forever, as he said, from danger of phi- 
mosis. 

The Maurusian men were not on the floor of the meeting- 
house, nor yet the maiden in the gallery. 

“Did you see her?” asked Philos, when they had returned 
to the street. 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


41 


“ Whom ? How do you know she belongs to that peo- 
ple ? Let us go to the Leipodermian Quarter.” 

“ Observant ubi festa mero pede sabbata reges, 

Et vetus indulget senibus dementia porcis. 

I never said she did. I but told you she was in the com- 
pany of such : and my informer was no apostle. But why 
should she be one thing in religion more than another ? She 
may be a Salaman : the faiths are not unlike. What shall 
we do for pastime? Shall we enter one of the Jesousian 
temples ? Or will you rather wait till we pass the spot 
where, when the sea flowed there, the doorkeeper of Heaven 
moored his boat, and building an altar celebrated divine ser- 
vice on his way to the metropolis where he was to be buried, — 
both events being equally true ? Which really now are the more 
superstitious, these Leipod / ermi we have left, who, under the 
monstrous idea of its being Heaven-inculcated, adhere to a 
rite which they obviously borrowed from their taskmasters, 
although it is no longer needed in these climates, ( if, with 
proper cleanliness and cold water, it ever were anywhere, ) or 
these modern Anastesians who, claiming to be enlightened 
by celestial revelation, tread in the very steps of their heathen 
ancestors in almost every superstitious belief, as you will 
have occasion to see.” 

“ There,” he resumed in a whisper, as hat in hand they 
stepped within the principal church : “ look at those anathe- 
mata or ex-voto. If you had been brought here in a sound 
sleep and suddenly woke up, would you not think you were 
in an ancient temple ? 

* Me tabula sacer 
Votiva paries ’—etcetera." 

! 

The schoolmaster’s eyes were bent on the collection of 
baby-things, as they appeared, — little legs, and arms, and 
hearts, and other memorials, mostly covered with tinsel, 
which were strung upon an image of a favorite saint or hung 


42 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


before it, in performance of a vow or in gratitude for liis sup- 
posed intercession in the cure of maladies in the correspond- 
ing parts of the givers’ bodies. “ And there is almost the 
very thing — umdo mavis deo — a bit of a fisliingnet and 
miniature oar.” He looked up at his tall companion, to see 
if he was struck with this new proof that few human follies 
change. Alethitheras was affording an especial one of his 
own. 

Service was not yet over. On two chairs directly in front 
of them, knelt two young girls in the captivating costume of 
the country. The black lace vail, thrown over the gilded 
comb, the large filagree gilt earrings, indicated, as well as the 
quality of their dress, their inferior condition. Both had 
turned their heads to observe the strangers, their knees still 
bent upon the hard seat, their little brownish hands on the top 
of the chair-back, "while their eyes gravely sought the fresher 
objects which awoke an interest livelier than the accustomed 
rites in w r hich they had no direct participation. Both were 
handsome ; but one, whose large black eyes were bent w r itli 
a pensive earnestness on Alethi’s face alone, was the very 
image of the Maurusian of the Lazaret. There w r as the old 
blush too, carrying the sun-spot in her pearly cheek more and 
more over all the surface, and now, as Alethi’s own cheek 
colored, a smile, still pensive but encliantingly sweet, curled 
slightly the corners of her melancholy mouth and left the 
likeness unmistakable. 

Philoscommon did not sw T ear internally ; his reverence for 
religion, even where he had no sympathy for wdiat he con- 
sidered its mistaken rites, was too sincere for that ; but, for 
once at least in his life, he ceased to look jocose. 

The service is over ; and now the saddened schoolmaster 
sees the handsome girl, as her very graceful figure leaves its 
awkward form of prayer, lift her eyes suddenly to his com- 
panion with a flash like that he had witnessed in the Laza- 
ret, — rapid, vivid fatal, — lightning from a cloud of mid- 


OF ALETHIT1IE11AS. 


43 


niglit blackness. The next moment the victim, escaping 
from the kindly hand that was laid upon his sleeve, was 
threading the crowd of worshipers in pursuit of the two 
maidens. 

They did not lead him far. The town is not of great 
extent, and their course was a direct one ; not into the quarter 
of the Leipoderms, but yet into a street of humble houses, 
into one of which they both entered, the beauty of the Laza- 
ret looking now timidly and softly from the comer of her 
pensive eyes, and with that dangerous smile of her melan- 
choly mouth made still more dangerous by a subdued and 
reserved expression still more sad than usual. It was evident 
she had imparted nothing to her companion, for the latter 
looked surprised when turning she became aware of the 
presence of the two strangers, and seemed coquettislily to 
impute the attraction to herself. 

Alethi passed the house, repassed it, his friend and seeming 
valet, much annoyed, still following; but it was in vain. 
The damsel could not or would not reappear, at door or 
window. 

“ Philos',” said the former, when his companion had come 
up, and after looking back once more before they turned a 
corner, “ we shall not go to Clinepurgos to-day.” 

“ So I thought,” said the philosopher gravely. “ How will 
you pass the time? There is nothing in this place worth 
seeing — of things inanimate, — save perhaps the marble 
statue of the prince ; one of the figures at the base is by a 
famous hand. Or will you yield to some of the many good 
people who were so anxious to please you they would scarcely 
let us leave the hotel ? Shall we go to the artist in gems, for 
instance, and have your likeness cut in cammeo, to send 
home to the girl you left behind you ? ” 

“ That is rather hard,” said Alethi, wincing. 

“ Did your conscience tell you so ? — In fact, my dear 
Alethi, what are you about ? Is this to see the world ? ” 


44 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ A part of it, certainly. I should like, I confess, to know 
if that black-eyed girl be really a Maurusian, or what she 
now appears. She wore both habits naturally, and ” 

“ Charmingly. ’Tis easy, with her double-dealing sex. 
And is that all ? ” 

“Well — you certainly must admit she is very beautiful, 
and has a form ! ” 

“ I am not good at figures. Can you bear the truth ? ” 

“ From you ? Philos' ! ” 

“ That is very easy to exclaim. Men frequently go further, 
and solicit censure ; but they are generally disappointed and 
soured when they get it. I will venture though. This girl, 
you see by her surroundings, is of the lower classes. That 
she is beautiful I will not gainsay. But she is disposed, I 
think, like most women, to trade upon her charms.” — 

“ No, no. She is innocent, I would swear.” 

“ I did not think you so prone to perjury. He who would 
vouch for the innocence of a woman must be very inexpe- 
rienced, or very simple, or very honest. I put no faith in 
any of them. If you saw the coy, half-meeting half-averted 
look, and the repressed and melancholy smile, so did I the 
flash of fire from the darkest and most dangerous eyes I ever 
saw r in woman. How the mere mention «f it drives the blood 
into your cheeks ! Aletlii, that girl is mistress of her art, 
though she may not much have practiced it. All women 
who are beauties have it naturally; the miss of fourteen 
spreads her nets as dexterously as the stale coquette of forty, 
and much more effectively as the bait is fresher. Twice has 
this masquerading damsel struck you to the heart by a look 
purposely directed for that purpose. Do you think that 
when she smiled so sadly, yet so sweetly, it was to tell you 
not to come again, and how sorry she was to be obliged to 
leave you ? ” 

“ I will not say. There is a mystery at least I would like 
to fathom in that, as in her dress.” 


OF ALETHITHER AS. 


45 


“ No doubt, no doubt. Even in Alethitheras’ breast, Eros 
supplies an argument that is mere sham. But he who reasons 
with a lover is a greater fool than the lover himself. How 
much time do you mean to devote to this object ? ” 

“ I do not understand you.” 

“We have not come out to chase butterflies. But while 
the blood is heated in pursuit it is vain to call upon the 
urchin to give over, who will never tire while the insect 
keeps flitting near him, allowing him to almost touch her 
and but starting off afresh to lure him on, though to catch 
her is to take the plumy armor from her wings and mar her 
form, her flight perhaps, forever. You did not think I had 
so much poetry in me, did you ? Sometimes truth and poetry 
are one ; and this is now an instance. How long will you 
chase this gorgeous insect? What will you do with her, if 
caught ? ” 

“Perhaps but count the spots upon her wings. I do not 
know. Do not ask me, dear Philos'. Have patience but a 
little.” 

“But how long? We have not come for this, I must re- 
mind you. I will not speak of what you left behind you. 
But this I say, if honor now not bind you, — why, ’tis a very 
altered man I find you.” 

Aletlii laughed. The seeming nonsense of the rhymes had 
iust the effect the improwisator intended : love and laugh- 
ter, though alliterative, are rarely if ever congenerous. 
“ Well, give me to-morrow, dear Philos'. And if then I do 
not see this butterfly again, I’ll put on my hat and play the 
boy no longer.” 

He kept his word ; and without further talk of the insect, 
though Alethi by his sadness seemed to have her all the 
w T hile in mind, they arrived at Clinepurgos. Here the adrni- 
randa are grouped together conveniently in one place. They 
examined with pleasure the three famed gates of the cathe- 
dral. Then they wandered through the not less famous 


46 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


cemetery. There the Mentor took pains to point out to Te- 
lemachus the picture of Noah inebriate. A young female 
flying from the sight looks back upon the naked patriarch, 
but covers her face with her hand. “ You see,” said the 
sage, “ there is space enough between her fingers. If she has 
not spread them purposely, she may be thought at least to 
use them.” 

“ It is a gross conception,” said Alethitheras, “ and derog- 
atory to the art, as much else we see in the sacred subjects of 
this place.” 

“ But it is not the less natural,” returned the sage. 

“ Nature needs selection,” rejoined Aletlii ; “ and it shows 
a vulgar mind to choose ignoble attributes where noble ones 
would represent her better.” 

“ I not deny it,” was the surrejoinder: “ I but called your 
notice to it for an object. Of such a type is the modesty 
of your innocent Maurusian.” 

“ I shall never put it to the test,” said Alethi, rather re- 
gretfully. 

“ I hope not, — in Noah’s way,” said Philoseommon. 

They entered the Tower. A subsidence in the earth had 
caused it to lean in such a way that it seemed to threaten its 
own eversion ; but the solidity of the masonry w r as such that 
time had had no effect on its consistence. It stood a deform- 
ity ; the beauty designed by the architect having disappeared 
to leave but a monument to the integrity and skill of the 
builder. Yet such is the declination that when our travelers, 
arrived at the summit, stepped outside on the narrow space 
around, though Philoseommon remarked that the line of 
gravity still fell within the base of the structure, it made his 
tall companion almost nervous as he saw the wall behind 
him seemingly in the very act of falling. As they leaned 
against it, there came out on the same place of view a man 
about thirty years old who was dressed in a manner to cari- 
cature a fashion, had the cut of his clothes been moderately 


OF A L E T H I T II E R A S . 


47 


in tlie mode. But it was not. A high black hat, whose 
crown was a truncated cone and brim was as flat and narrow 
as the edge of a dinner-plate; a dark blue frock, padded 
and frogged on the breast, with broad black ribbons cross- 
ing from row to row of the long frogs and pendent from 
them with detached ends, the top of the skirt stuffed and 
gathered in plaits so as to make the hips still fuller and give 
still more slenderness to the constricted waist; trowsers 
bagged and plaited at the hips and tight at the ancles, where 
the varnished boots were armed behind with an enormous 
pair of gilt spurs ; a riding- whip in his hand ; the absurdity 
of his appearance was not the less conspicuous by a con- 
sciousness apparent in his very ordinary, but savagely mous- 
tached face, that it really was so. He looked at Pliiloscom- 
mon distrustfully, as the latter observed in his own tongue 
to Aletlii :* 

“ Has the fellow left his horse below, or has lie come up 
here as to a horse-block ? Does n't he look like a poet, with 
those long ringlets ? If a reasonably big cloud were now to 
descend, one might expect to see him leap upon it and strad- 
dle it for a liippogriff I’ll ask him what the time is. — 
Sir,” he said, addressing with grave politeness the coxcomb 
in the Alectryonic tongue, “ might I put you to the trouble 
to tell me the time of day ? ” 

The knight of the clouds drew’ out a watch from the right 
side of his waistband, then another from a pocket on the left, 
and comparing the two replied : “ Noon, less a quarter. The 
hour, I see, is not much later here than in Lutetia. I have 
both times.” 

“You are then a Lutetian, sir. I judged as much from 
your accent.” 

“ I have that honor,” answered the gentleman ot the frogs, 
evidently much pleased. 

“ It is an honor,” resumed Philosc.^ “ I read it also in the 
novelty of your costume, which really puts us both to shame.” 


48 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Before the Lutetian could muster up his wits, the school- 
master led the way for his companion, more annoyed than 
amused, to the stairs within. 

That very afternoon, whom should they see at the public 
table of their hotel, but the man of spurs. He sat at the 
head of the table, and with his hat on during the whole 
meal, although no other man, even of his own countrymen, 
if any such were present, was so distinguished. He rose 
before the dessert was served and passed down the whole 
length of the room toward the door, near which our travelers 
were placed. As he came opposite Philos, the latter hailed 
him in Alectryom 

“Pardon, sir — but I am delighted with your hat. It is 
so distinguished, and becomes, you so much, as you wear it, 
I must ask you where to buy one like it.” 

Shallow though he was, Alectryon saw the ridiculousness 
of a quarrel with the owner of the proboscis, and looked 
around him as if seeking some proper object for his wrath, 
and finally pitched on Alethi ; but as no one smiled, and the 
latter looked more than serious, he lifted his beaver and 
waving it toward Philoscommon said : 

“ I would give you this, if you could get it on that head.” 

“ I could on the top of it,” instantly replied Philosc ; 
“ but you will excuse me ; I see now it would make me look 
too like a fool.” 

The Lutetian put on his extinguisher, and vanished with 
the light of his countenance through the open door. 


OP ALE T HIT H ERAS. 


49 


CHAPTER VJ . 

They go to the City of Art , where Alethi gives a lesson to a 
would-be dilletante. 

There was nothing to detain them in the city of the 
leaning tower, and they set out for Clyt&teclmA It was 
stipulated that the conveyance should carry them through 
at once. But about half-way the driver stopped. They sup- 
posed it was to change horses ; but presently the keeper of 
the hostelry came out to invite them in to supper. 

“ But we don’t want supper. We want to proceed,” re- 
plied Alethi. 

“ That is impossible,” said the ho£t. “ The gentlemen 
will stop for the night.” 

“We shall do no such thing,” returned Alethi, still more 
positively. “ Send that rascal to us.” 

“ Whom, sir ? ” 

“ The driver.” 

“ If you move him,” observed Philos 7 , “ I shall believe in 
miracles.” 

The driver came. “ Put-to your horses, instantly,” said 
Alethi imperiously. 

“ It is impossible, sir.” 

“ Fellow ! Remember the stipulation.” 

“ Certainly. But the road is beset by banditti.” 

“Pshaw!” said Alethi contemptuously. “Besides, that 
is our business.” . 

“ With the gentleman’s leave, I think it is mine,” returned 
3 


50 


T RAVELS BY S E A AND L A N D 


the driver, with an emphasis as obstinate as the cut of his 
face and the massiveness of his chest and shoulders. 

“ You w T ill not then go ? ” said the traveler in suppressed 
rage. 

“No, sir.” 

“ Then mark me : you get no drink-money.” 

The fellow shrugged his shoulders. 

“You will see,” said Philosc, as they set to work to get 
out their valuables, “ how he will behave to-morrow. I 
should have warned you, that in this country the drivers are 
all in league with the inn-keepers, and a written contract is 
always needful.” 

On tlieir way to their room, which Alethi, determined not 
to be cheated further than he was obliged to be, ordered to 
be prepared at once, as they would not take supper, they 
passed the door of the kitchen. On the floor sat the driver 
with another fellow opposite him similarly seated, and a 
motley group standing round them. The two were playing 
dice at a game which the schoolmaster told Alethi was very 
ancient, and were coarsely and extravagantly noisy, and used 
violent gesticulations. Alethi touched the driver’s shoulder 
with his sheathed umbrella. 

“ You will see,” he said “ to the portmanteaus.” 

“ Presently,” said the man, without moving, then crying in 
his uncouth and unintelligible way to his antagonist some 
point in the game, which he had made while answering 
Alethi. 

“ This is unbearable,” said Alethi in his own tongue. 
“ Philos 7 , watch a moment till I place these things in safety, 
and I will arrange the matter.” 

This was effected, by a distinct threat to the landlord, 
that unless everything was instantly brought up to their 
bedrooms, they would return to the carriage and pass the 
night therein. 

They might have better. The air of the double room, 


OF ALEIHITHERAS. 


51 


■wliicli was over the stable, was horribly redolent of the ex- 
ecrable stifling odor of the stalls, and the fleas, which had 
not supped for many a night perhaps, made the most of 
their opportunity. 

“ I would advise you not to breakfast,” said Philoscom- 
mon in the morning, “only I know it will be set down 
along with supper in the bill. So you might as well have 
the worth of your money.” But the breakfast was uneat- 
able; the bread sour, heavy and badly baked, the eggs 
scarcely turned, and the coffee a decoction of burnt acoms 
and chicory. Alethi was in a bad humor. Philos' looked 
as if he expected amusement. 

There was a new driver. But the old stood at the open 
door of the carriage, and put out his hand. 

“ Proceed,” said the traveler to the new driver. 

The driver never budged. “ Do you hear me ? ” repeated 
Alethi. He sat inflexible. The group of gamblers stood 
around the old driver, and the host watched maliciously from 
the sill of the inn-door. 

“ Mark me,” resumed Alethi, in a louder voice and with 
great distinctness. “ The fellow who drove us hither goes 
without his bounty. Unless you start, this very instant, I 
promise you you shall fare as ill.” 

There was a turn of the driver’s shoulder, and he beckoned 
to one of the bystanders, who shut the door of the carriage. 
The reins were drawn up rather more tightly, the whip raised 
a little, but the horses did not move. 

“ Let me” said Philos'. “ Hark you, my friend. If you 
delay one minute longer, we take another vehicle, and besides 
will have you before the magistrate.” The whip cracked, 
the horses started. 

“ What a set ! ” cried the first driver. “ But the old one is 
more of a man than the master.” 

“ If I were n’t, we should change places,” roared Philos' at 
the window. 


52 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ The devil go with you both ! ” cried the fellow after 
them. 

“Amen!” said Philosc, as he sat down. “So we shall 
have good driving.” 

When they reached the end of the journey, Alethi settled 
for the fare through the bookkeeper of the hotel. Philosc, 
who was busy at the time with the luggage, as beseemed his 
ostensible function, asked him what he had paid for drink- 
money. Alethi told him. Philosc laughed heartily. 

“You see,” he said, “they are all in league, as I told you. 
The clerk of this respectable place has actually made you 
pay double what is usual ; and the half of it will go to the 
driver you left unrequited.” 

“ But he had earned nothing but a whipping,” said Alethi. 

“ If you could have given it ; certainly not. But in this 
land, they make the drink-money a thing of course, and ex- 
l>ect it under all circumstances.” 

“ It is a vile habit,” said the younger traveler. “ Is every 
land we shall visit cursed with a system so demoralizing ? ” 

“ All civilized lands that I know of, except Isopoliteia.” 

“ Ah, how I long to get there ! ” 

The schoolmaster shrugged his shoulders and replied, 
“ Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof 1” 

ClytetechnS kept them several weeks ; for there was no end 
of the goodly things to see. One day, in a room of the noble 
gallery where is a famous statue of the goddess of beauty, 
they observed among other gazers a Chiliopolitan whom they 
had met in his native place. He recognized the strangers 
and bowed courteously. 

“ How are you pleased ? ” asked Alethi. 

“ Delighted ! enchanted ! ” replied the Chiliopolitan. “ I 
scarcely can express my wonderment, my ravishment ! ” He 
clasped his little hands as he spoke, and looked upward ; 
but his face was all but blank. “ And you ? ” he added, as 
he dropped his upward looks and unbent his fingers. 


OF ALETDITHERAS. 


53 


“ I am disappointed,” said Alethi. “ The stains and repa- 
rations take away all enjoyment. I see, after some study, 
that it is of admirable symmetry — though I speak diffi- 
dently in the matter. But the great statue at the end of 
the gallery you first enter is to my taste worth a thousand 
such.” 

The Cliiliopolitan looked slightly contemptuous ; but there 
were some one or two of the little crowd who looked as if 
they were relieved by what Alethi said, as if, in fact, he had 
said what they might w T ish but would not dare to say. Phil- 
oscommon observed it, and, to improve the occasion, said, so 
as to be heard : 

“You mean the dying man "who wrestles with the enor- 
mous snake ? ” 

“ I do,” replied Alethi. “ The sculptor who wrought that 
one figure in the group is the master of all masters I have 
seen. Here in this statue of female beauty is little more than 
exquisite workmanship ; in the other there is genius as well 
as skill. He who wrought it was wdiat an artist should be — 
a poet, and — a man.” 

“ Right,” cried Philosc. “ And the soul of him wffio 
wrought this dainty figure w T as effeminate.” 

Two of the listeners had already moved toward the door 
when Alethi ceased to speak, and now the rest of them went 
with one impulse to look at the statue of the man in agony. 
Hone was left but the Chiliopolitan, and he w r as busy ad- 
miring tw r o pictures of a similar subject with his former 
study and painted by the first of colorists, but painted with 
even less commendable effect. 

“ I was glad to hear you,” said Philoscommon, when they 
were alone. 

“What, speak as I thought?” said Alethitheras with a 
smile. 

“ Ho, that is nothing new, but read a lesson which has 
made good critics of those w ho heard you, at least for this 


54 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


one theme. I would have added something, but that I feared 
to be misinterpreted.” 

“ What was that ? ” 

“ I would have said it was the noblest of all illustrations 
of those memorable and pathetic words : My God ! my God ! 
why hast Thou forsaken me ? ” 


CHAPTER Y 1 1 . 

How the traveler found what icas lost , and continued his 
journey pleasantly to Ariospol-is. 

Annoyed by his recent traveling-experience, Alethi pro- 
posed that they should try the public conveyance to Arios- 
polis. 

“ By all means, said his companion cheerfully. “That is 
the only way to travel. Odysseus saw not only the cities of 
many nations, but made himself acquainted with the minds, 
that is, the characteristics of their inhabitants. Your private 
coach suits only those who are indifferent to humanity ; and 
hence it is so extensively used by the Philautians, who esteem 
no other race of men than their own, and who return to their 
own foggy island about as w ise in useful knowledge as when 
they left it.” 

In the stage-coach were two women of the country, and a 
man in whom they recognized the Chiliopolitan. So far the 
advantages of their plebeian mode of travel were not ob- 
vious, as though Philoscommon could readily converse with 
both of the women, Alethitheras could not understand with- 
out difficulty either of them, although he could make him- 
self understood by them. To avoid the male traveler there- 
fore, wdio w r as insipid and tiresome, Alethi varied his talk 
with his friend by reading. They passed a night in an ob- 


OF ALETIIITIIEEA8. 


55 


scure place, and the next day arrived at a somewhat noted 
city on a hill. Here all the passengers got out. The Chilio- 
politan, driveling all the way, accompanied our pair to the 
only collection of art which, the town could exhibit, although 
it was the birthplace of a painter better known through the 
fame of his illustrious pupil than by his own pencil. The 
Chiliopolitan, doting as usual on the stained and mutilated 
relics of antiquity, had no eyes for anything fresh. Accord- 
ingly, Alethi having discovered something admirable in a 
group of the Graces, he could scarcely be induced to turn 
back two steps to see it. 

“ But you overlook,” said Alethi, “ the name of the sculp- 
tor. It is, you see, by the famous Cellavinaria.” 

“ No, it is n’t,” said the connoisseur with peevishness : 
“ Cellavinaria was a Marquis.” 

“ But he was a cavalier before he was a Marquis, and sim- 
ple Notiano Cellavinaria before he was either,” returned 
Alethi with a smile. “ Nay, look there,” he continued, point- 
ing to the back of the plinth. 

The Chiliopolitan approached, rather impatiently and dis- 
dainfully, and read to his great vexation : “ Presented by 
the Marquis Notiano Cellavinaria to the city of Busepia.” 

When the coach started again, the Chiliopolitan suddenly 
discovered he was tired of its slowness and remained behind. 

“ I never thought we should be indebted to the Graces 
for such a riddance,” observed ,the schoolmaster. 

“Yet are they not the patronesses of whatever is amia- 
ble ? ” suggested his friend. 

“ True, and must abhor the soulless jargon of dilletante- 
ism, as all that is insincere and simulated. But, the devil ! 
they are giving us too much of the amiable, I fear,” ho 
added, as he set his foot after Alethi on the- step of their 
vehicle, and saw, instead of one of the women, who had re- 
mained at the mountain-city, w T hich was her home, the 
beautiful Maurusian of the Lazaret. Alethi had already 



5G 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


planted himself beside her, and her eyes were bent down on 
a sort of flexible basket or osier reticule in her lap, with 
whose double handle she fumbled, only too conscious, and 
giving through her sunny cheeks a more than welcome. 
“ It is of no use to kick against the pricks — even where it 
is no stuff of the conscience,” exclaimed the philosopher, 
who had made himself as familiar with the evangelism of 
Jesousian nations as with their literature ; “ so, as I can’t 
prevent you, I will do as I would be done by, and make 
love to this middle-aged lady.” And he set himself to work 
accordingly, with his ugly phiz, but most delightful tongue. 

“ What a happiness ! ” said Alethi earnestly, but softly, 
to the damsel with the reticule. “ I feared I should never 
see you again.” 

There was no answer, and no look; but the reddened 
cheek grew redder, and the little brown fingers played nerv- 
ously in and out the overlapping handles of the basket. He 
spoke in Anastesian, and was half in doubt if she understood 
him ; but he continued, with the same tone : 

“ I hope I did not offend you that day in the Lazaret. I 
did not stop to think if those men had any right to play 
that trick npon you. Were they your friends ? ” 

A voice, round, rich, yet soft in tone, answered in the 
same noble tongue, but ■with an accent that was perceptibly 
foreign even to Alethi’s ear. 

“ They were my uncles.” ■ 

“ Are you then Maurusian ? ” 

“ On one side.” 

“Which?” 

“ The father’s, sir.” 

“ It was such a mystery to me to see you in a church in 
the costume of the country, whom but a few days before I 
had met as an Abylan.” — 

The girl looked up with a smile half coquettish half in- 
nocent, but from the still melancholy curvature of her lips 


OF ALETHITIEEAS. 


57 


inexpressibly beautiful, and Alethi, impulsively bringing liis 
knees nearer to her, said, interpreting the look, “You want 
to know in which you looked most charming. I will tell 
you. But first tell me which is natural to you.” 

“My father was of Abyla and” — a little hesitation — 
“ a Leipoderm, as are both my uncles ; but my mother was 
of this country, as was her mother before her, while her 
father came from the North, whence I derive my familiar 
name, which was my mother’s, when with her friends.” — 

“ And that ? ” said Alethi softly. 

“ Is Minnchen.” 

“ It is a very pretty name. But continue.” 

“ My father was a very handsome man, as my mother was, 
I think, the handsomest woman I ever saw. So she married 
him for love, despite his religion ; and for her sake, as well 
as his, they fled together to Jactantia, where I was born near 
Geb’al-Tarik, and was bred up in her faith, — my father, 
who could refuse her nothing, never in the least opposing I 
have heard.” 

“ I can believe it,” said Alethi. “ Did she look like you ? ” 

“They say so,” answered Minnchen, casting down her 
eyes till their long lashes rested like a fringe of silk upon 
her cheek. “ So you see why my speech is broken. I fear 
you have much pains to understand me.” 

“ No, no,” said Alethi, who had noticed, now she spoke 
more at length, that many phrases of the land of her birth 
that were more consonant with her father’s tongue mixed with 
the still nobler and not less grandiloquent speech that was 
her mother’s : “ I understand you very well ; better, I fear, 
than you do me. And then it sounds so pretty ! ” 

5 In fact the traveler found his account in the medley, for 
he would ask her often to repeat what she had said, and in 
his efforts to understand, and hers to explain, she sometimes 
spelling out for him the word, their eyes were oftener on 
each other, and Alethi watched so closely the motions of her 
3 * 


58 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


mouth that the very words became associated with it, and 
ever after brought the parting full red lips before him and 
the snowy teeth they covered and revealed by turns. Cer- 
tainly, they were getting on very well together. 

“ Well ? ” he continued inquiringly. 

“ Well, in time — when I was seven years old ” 

“ When was that, Minnchen ? ” 

“ It is nine years ago last J anuary, sir. — We went to live in 
my father’s country. There, a little while ago, not quite two 
years, my mother died. An aunt of hers, who lives in Li- 
burnum, was anxious, for my soul’s sake she said, to have me 
with her, and my uncles, who had business in Liburnum, 
brought me on.” 

“ And how had I the happiness, after losing you a second 
and, as I thought, for the last time, to meet you here ? ” 

“ Oh sir, you are making me tell you all about me, and you 
have not told me yet what you promised.” 

“ What was that ? Howl liked you best? Well, Minn- 
chen, when I saw you first, I thought your dress became you 
well, or you it ; at least I did not wish you better. Then in 

the church I liked you, O much more ! But now ” 

One of the little brown hands was on the body of the basket, 
quite near him, while the other played with the handle in a 
very childish way. Alethi, for emphasis, laid a hand of his 
on the one that was spread out and quiet. It shrunk a little, 

but suffered itself to be covered up. “ But now ” 

At that moment, Philoscommon turned his eyes on the 
party, and exclaimed aloud in his own tongue, “It is all 
over ! ” and the little hand emerged again. It was a pity, 
they were getting on so very well together. 

“What did you say?” asked Philoscommon’s neighbor. 

“ Excuse me, madam. I was saying, in my own tongue, 
that I gave it all up, now.” 

“ I hope not. It was so interesting ! ” 

“ To those who understood it ; I dare say.” 


OF ALETHITIIEHA8. 


59 


“ O, I understand tlie gentleman very well. He talks like 
an angel. So please don’t give it up yet.” 

After such a compliment, what could the schoolmaster do? 
He bowed his great head, with a smile which if it was not 
handsome would have been at least expressive to Alethi, had 
he seen it. But the latter, very red, was looking down, ap- 
parently on the hand he had relinquished, while Minnchen, 
quite as red, looked nervous, and seemed waiting. At length 
Alethi resumed his question in another form ; and the 
maiden told him that a sister of her mother’s who lived at 
Ariospolis had invited her to live with her, and she w r as now 
on her way thither, having been accompanied to the city they 
had just left by her great aunt, who she said did not seem to 
care for her at all. 

“ And do you know if this new relative will love you ? ” 

“Alas, no, sir. But I am a poor orphan ; what can I do ? ” 
How Alethi’s heart vibrated ! And his voice showed it, as he 
asked again : 

“ And are you going thither all alone ? ” 

“ All alone.” 

Alone. What made him tremble? Was it with joy? or 
with apprehension ? 

Whatever was the cause of the emotion, it did not paralyze 
his fingers, whose rosy tips stole over the darker but well 
shaped and more delicate extremities of hers, which seemed 
to love imprisonment, or felt it was impossible to escape it. 
So, like a little bird, they lay quite still, and let themselves 
be covered up completely. Then Alethitheras continued his 
discourse, wdiicli became more and more voluble, but lower 
and softer in tone. You would have thought he was born to 
speak Anastesian. And Minnchen listened so divinely, grow- 
ing more beautiful, if it were possible, every minute. And 
she answered too so candidly, so simply, and with that 
strange sad thrilling smile of hers, every question, till she had 
told him how to find the very house in the topmost floor of 


GO 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


which slie was to live in Ariospolis, till slie had promised to 
meet him, on the day next that of their arrival, in a spot 
which was not in the house, whence they would stroll away 
together, and see the sky, and the woods, and the green 
earth, and the laughing water, and be happy as the birds in 
the branches, and musical to one another even as they. 

At this point of the dialogue inaudible almost except to 
them, Philosc was leaning out of the window at his side, 
and directing his neighbor’s attention, who was leaning too, 
to some object at a distance from the road, when suddenly a 
sound was heard, from the neighborhood of the opposite 
window, very like a kiss, not loud, nor rustical, yet distinct 
and very relishing. Starting unpleasantly, and looking in- 
ward, the philosopher thereby awoke his neighbor’s atten- 
tion to what might otherwise have had for her no signifi- 
cance. 

“ What was that ? ” she asked. 

“ A report of progress,” answered the sage. 

“A what?” 

“ You know, my dear, when the driver or postilion sounds 
his whip, be it ever so light a smack, it shows he is bent to 
get on.” 

“ But was it a smack, sir ? ” 

“ It sounded very like one. You see, my master ” 

“ Master ? I thought the gentleman was your friend.” 

“ So he is. He is my master because I serve him, and my 
friend because he lets me. You see, I say, he is looking at 
his watch and is very red. He evidently thinks it is best to 
take time by the forelock.” 

“ And the young lady has her face out at the window. I 
had no idea we were behindhand. But in fact, sir, your 
talk is so amusing, we might be at a funeral and I should 
not know it.” 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


61 


CHAPTER VIII. 

They visit the great temple of Ariospolis. What they saio 
therein , and what they had to see thereout. 

Ariospolis is the capital of a country whose potentate is 
a priest and whose government is sacerdotal. Everything 
therefore is conducted there in the very best manner to ob- 
tain admittance to Paradise in Heaven, and the very worst 
to secure it upon earth. 

“ You see,” said Philoscommon, “ that woman crawling 
painfully on her knees up the lofty flight of steps to that 
church. At the foot of them was found this very morning a 
man assassinated. His murderer, or the man who hired 
him, will probably satisfy his conscience by some such lacer- 
ation of the body, and repeat the deed the first time his 
passions urge him or his avarice is tempted. The outward 
acts of religion and its physical penalties are at once the 
easiest and the most satisfactory to the human conscience. 
Consequently in Ariospolis the people do the most abomina- 
ble things for the purpose of repenting them.” 

“ It is an insult to Providence,” said Alethi indignantly. 

“ Ho, it is a compliment to the Devil, who roasts eternally 
in fire which tortures his body though it consumes not. The 
Ariospolitans suppose a purgatory which purifies the soul 
for heavenly beatitude by suffering applied to the resuscitated 
body. It is inevitable therefore that on earth a similar lus- 
tration must obtain.” 

“ Surely such a religion had never a divine origin.” 


62 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ If any ever liad, it had. Its founder and the immediate 
teachers of his faith condemned continually this mortifica- 
tion of the flesh. But the knees of the body bend easily, 
the genuflexion of the heart is to the last degree difficult, 
and priestcraft profits by pointing out the readier way.” 

“ What does that man ask me ? ” said the younger traveler ; 
“I could not perfectly understand him.” Philoscommon 
told him. “ What ! do they pimp in the open streets ? by 
daylight ? ” cried Alethi. 

“ Why not, when procuration, though of another kind, is 
continually going on in the churches ? ” 

They arrived at the great temple of Ariospolis, one of the 
wonders of the world. They stopped awhile at the obelisk 
and the fountains, and entered one of the great colonnades 
on their way to the portico. Philosc observed Alethi put 
his handkerchief to his nostrils while, frowning with dis- 
gust, he kept his feet carefully in the middle of the pave- 
ment, and avoided looking at the base of the columns. 

“ Ordure in the entrance to the House of God ? ” cried the 
traveler at last, when finally out of danger. 

“ To his holiest temple as they think, as it certainly is 
the most sumptuous. You may read a moral in it, of the 
people who practice the pollution and the priests who per- 
mit it.” 

“ But what are these fellows with halberds ? Guards in a 
temple ? ” 

“ The High Priest is a temporal Prince as well as Pontiff. 
All sovereigns have guards. They mingle the pomp of state 
with the utility of precaution.” 

“ In the present case the buffoonery of the costume takes 
off some of the offensiveness of their presence.” 

“ Do n’t let anybody hear you ridicule it. It was designed, 
they say, by one of their foremost sculptors and painters.” 

“ It is not the less grotesque, and seems to make this place 
the entrance to a show of mummers.” 


OF ALETHITHERA8, 


63 


“You will find much of the same grotesqueness in some 
of the designer’s greatest art-creations, as they dot with an 
unseemly ludicrousness the masculine verse-paintings of his 
great countryman, the foremost poet of the land. I must 
not forget to tell you that all these men are foreigners. The 
Pontiff who blesses his people dares not trust to them. And 
he is right. The time will come when the hired soldiers of 
a Prince will not patrol the peaceful avenues of the Palace 
of God.” 

“ Amen ! ” 

“ But the anomaly is of a piece with that of the govern- 
ment.” 

They now entered the body of the church. 

“ Mark now,” continued Philosc in a whisper, “ that group 
about that brazen statue.” 

“ Apparently a family, father, mother, and three children. 
They kiss one of the toes ; with what devotion ! ” 

“ Mouth- worship ; the next moment to be forgotten. It is 
the due to the saint ; and they render it without reflection, 
through the habit of their religion.” 

“ I see the toe is bright, and actually worn as well as pol- 
ished.” 

“ The attrition may have begun before our era'; tor the 
saint of bronze was once a heathen god. He whose name it 
bears is claimed by the Pontiffs as their predecessor, and yon- 
der, elevated against the wall, within that chair, is the chair 
in which as such he sat. Which you may believe or not, as 
you like. It does not matter, as you are damned in any way, 
- like other Gentiles.” 

“ And where is his body, or his tomb ? ” 

“ Under the altar yonder, beneath that gorgeous canopy 
with the twisted brazen columns, to make whose splendid 
ugliness they stripped the noblest of ancient temples. There 
he lies, by a wonderful preservation, certainly, of near two 
thousand years, — the twentieth part of which would reduce 


64 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


common, men to powder, — lies the first Pontiff, — who 
never, I am well persuaded, so much as set his blessed toe on 
any of the Seven Hills.” 

“ Surely men would not maintain without some basis so 
stupendous an imposture, and kneel and pray because of it 
and for its sake.” 

“Not when it is a part of the foundation on which rests 
the structure of the Eternal Church ? There are many more 
as stupendous in the world, though none perhaps whose edi- 
fice is built upon so slight a base.” 

“ And what is that ? ” 

“The allowable belief that one word means another, and 
that the city of Belus is a figurative pseudonym for Arios- 
polis. But see, happily for our conversion perhaps, accursed 
infidels that we are, yonder goes for some occasion or other 
the Sovereign Priest himself, borne on his litter on men’s 
shoulders and surrounded by his guards. Let us get nearer.” 

As they approached, the captain of the guard called out 
aloud to the bystanders that were gathered on the way of 
the procession, To your knees ! They, but not our travelers, 
knelt, when the Priest, a respectable-looking old man with 
a not very respectable bottle-nose, extended two fingers in a 
classical way, to bless them. 

“ Admire,” said Philoscommon, after the train had passed, 
“ the progression of ideas. That vinous-nosed old gentleman 
with his Sybarite apparel, borne about in a Sybarite way by 
human mules, and girt-in by weapons that are forged against 
human life, is the representative of a rude man who handled 
fish for a living, though he once misused a sword, and who 
would have thought a shapeless wrapper of the coarsest 
wool a more than comfortable garment, even after he was 
honored to be a messenger of the doctrines of submissive 
charity and unaggressive peace.” 

“ And what is the character of the present Pontiff? ” 

“ He is accounted liberal. He squanders money to restore 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


65 


old churches that are scarcely used, and being in out-of-the-way 
places are rarely visited, furnishes others at vast expense with 
pavements too beautiful to tread upon, and with other orna- 
mental reparations that add not one item of utility to walls 
that are sufficiently solid and once were held adorned enough, 
yet opposes every effort to complete a road between his capi- 
tal and seaport which would at once add to the comfort, the 
wealth, the enjoyment of his subjects, whose happy counte- 
nances would radiate more praise to God than a thousand 
pictures on canvas or in tesselated stone.” 

“ And how is he in his sentiments ? ” 

“ What do you mean to ask ? ” 

“ If he is tolerant, or otherwise.” 

“ You shall judge. He has just issued a circular letter to 
all his subordinates in every part of the world, condemning 
the indoctrination of free ideas in politics, independence in 
letters, and universality of education, and inculcating the 
absolute subservience of all civil polity to the ordinances of 
the Church, which he pronounces in effect to be the sole 
judge of good and evil on earth as the only dispenser of their 
reward or punishment hereafter.” 

“ But the day of such belief is surely past. Men pin not 
now their faith upon the amice of a priest, and princes would 
laugh to scorn the ban that once denied them fire and water. 
It is many generations since a crowned emperor stood shoe- 
less on the frozen snow, night after night, beneath the closed 
windows of an insolent churchman, who on his soft pillow 
shut his ears to an appeal for pardon where the Master he 
pretended to represent would have ordered him to beg it.” 

“ Yet the ban continues none the less, and was only lately 
used against certain insurrectionists in his territories. It is a 
beautiful commentary on a certain Sermon on a Mount which 
I have read to you. Will you hear some of it ? ” The school- 
master opened his pocketbook and took out a scrap of 
printed paper. “ I have saved it,” he said, <c apart from its own 


G6 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


deserving, for a special purpose. Thus it begins : ‘ In the 

name of the’ You will spare however the enumeration 

of Heaven’s potentates, which, in an amplification that to you 
would be blasphemous, makes the preamble. — ‘ We excom- 
municate and curse this robber and evil-doer and banish him 
from the paths of Holy Church, that, damned to everlasting 
torments, he may descend to the pool of Hell with Coram, 
Dathan, and Abiram, and with those who dare to say to the 
God of Omnipotence : Get thee far from us, for we wish not 
to know thy way. And in the same manner as fire is ex- 
tinguished by water, shall his soul be extinguished in the 
eternity of time, until he amend and do penance. Be he 
accursed of God the Father ’ Here comes again an atro- 

cious enumeration of all the Powers of the Jesousian Heaven. 
I will pass it, though it is attractive by its horrible com- 
pleteness of specification. ‘May he be accursed wherever ho 
may be, in his house or in the field, by highway and by 
by-way, in the wood, on the water, or in the church. May he 
be accursed in his life and in his death, while eating and while 
drinking, when ’ ” 

“ jSTo more ! ” exclaimed the hearer. 

“ Ah, indulge me ! ” said the sage. “ I was always an ad- 
mirer of the tautological verbiage and reduplicative precise- 
ness of the law ; here is a siilendid specimen in the ecclesias- 
tical line. It does not allow of a flaw in the maledictory 
indictment, and through no loophole of a defective phrase- 
ology can the accursed escape. It was promised the original 
piscatory holder of the double keys that he should be a 
fisher of men. Perhaps these verbal meshes are a figurative 
realization of the anthropodictualotory idea.” 

“ Anthropo — what ? ” 

“ Homiretecaptatory, if you ’d rather,” answered the school- 
master. “ It is a moderately big word for a very grand theme. 
Let me resume, before we get hearers, and perhaps trouble, 
upon us. — ‘ while eating and w hile drinking, when lie satis- 


OF ALETHIT H E It A 8 . 


G7 


ties his hunger or quenches his thirst, in fasting, in sleeping, 
in waking, standing, working, or going. May he be accursed 
in every part of his body, as well inwardly as outwardly, in 
his hair as in his brain. May no single part of his body be 
sound, from the top of his trunk to the sole of his feet. 
May”’ 

“ Stop ! ” said Alethitheras. “ Such wickedness is enough 
to bring down the walls upon us.” 

“ If the actual crimes that have been not only designed but 
perpetrated in this temple, even on the very steps of its altar, 
could have so shaken the inanimate surroundings, this monu- 
ment of pomp and vanity would never have been completed 
in the name of a religion which professes to be founded by 
him whose sole prayer was in ten lines, and who made the 
whole spirit of religious observance to consist in the obedi- 
ence of two precepts, love of God and justice to one’s fellow. 
In Ariospolis, my dear Alethi, scarcely anything has changed 
but the houses and the costumes. As the palaces are built 
mostly of the plundered temples, tombs and baths of its 
ancient princes, so its religion is little more than Leipod'er- 
mism in its external form and internal faith engrafted on the 
superstitions and pageantry of heathenism. And this is at 
once its history and analysis.” 


i 


68 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER IX. 

The Schoolmaster discourses on appearances, and in conclusion 
makes a confession. 

Such is the almost endless succession of objects to be seen 
in Ariospolis, that months are required for the view where in 
other cities days suffice. Absorbed in a fresher delight, 
Alethitheras gave but few of his hours reluctantly to their 
observation, and would return weary, often disappointed, 
sometimes disgusted, to beauty whose magic no modern 
pencil could rival, gracefulness no antique statue surpassed, 
and to a pleasantness and sweetness of mien and voice and 
temper which never lessened with familiarity and often 
seemed to him to excel in attractiveness the graces and the 
beauty he had first adored. Philoscommon shook his head 
in vain ; the sage suggested doubts unheeded ; the friend 
and companion durst not remind him of the nobler love he 
sacrificed at home. Minnchen was his pupil, and though he 
would not admit that her talents were above the ordinary 
intelligence of females, yet the experienced schoolmaster 
could not deny her docility, and patience, and submissiveness 
to correction. 

“ But for all that,” he said, “ I would not be too sure. 
Try her paces for at least a twelvemonth, and don’t be too 
ready to purchase a Barbary filly whose pedigree you know 
not, and who may be only fit ” 

“What the devil would you have?” cried Alethi, inter- 


OP ALETHITHERAS, 


69 


rupting Mm and almost angrily. “ Do you deny the girl 
honesty ? ” 

“ No, so far as I can see.” 

“ Candor ? ” 

“ No, so far as one may judge.” 

“ Is she not simple and artless as a child ? Do not her 
very voice, her very smile, — that sad sweet smile, which 
brings at times the tears into my eyes to look at it,” — ( Phil- 
oscommon’s head was averted. It was not to hide a tear, 
but the wicked wrinkles of his nose — ) “ do not the very 
way in which she welcomes you, and the earnestness with 
which she listens to your reproof, promising so sweetly too, 
to try and do better the next time, that you have often told 
me yourself that you found her resistless, does not every- 
thing about her confirm my judgment as well as justify my 
taste ? ” 

“ Forgive me. These are admirable and amiable quali- 
ties, I admit ; but they may be constitutional. To ascertain 
the soul, it must be sounded.” 

“ Philos' ! Philos' ! ” 

“ I have had too much experience, my dear Alethi, to be 
satisfied. My tastes, my heart ( if I may say so, or you will 
believe it of a thing so leathern, ) acquiesce ; but my judg- 
ment, my brain requires proof. The expression of the eyes 
depends on their formation, and may be absolutely physical ; 
the melancholy of a smile is connate too, and does not come 
of sentiment; the pleasantness of manner is often purely 
animal goodnature, — indeed, I would say you will meet the 
most of it, especially in women, where there is least of soul ; 
and as for voice and tone, I have found falsehood quite as 
frequently with persons free of speech, and, where men, manly 
and outspoken, as with the shy and hesitating. It is but a 
matter of nerve and assurance, united with lack of conscien- 
tiousness.” 

il No, no, not with her.” 


70 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ No, not witli her, assurance, any more than nerve ; I was 
but speaking of the mass in general, and had in mind the 
especial instance of frank, outspoken men. The Philau- 
tians are conspicuous among all people for this very decept- 
iveness. To listen to them is, till you find them out, to be 
convinced that there is not a nobler, more generous, more 
truthful people on the face of the earth. In fact, they claim 
to be the most so, and perhaps their claim is founded on this 
very appearance and illusiveness, the candor of look and 
the sincerity of tone, which deceive themselves. They are 
indeed about as manly a race of men as the world can show 
anywhere, but of all liars, if you except the ancient CEbal- 
ians and the modern Children of the Sun, the most frontless, 
as of all maligners the most insolent and abusive, and, where 
detraction is the servant of self-interest, the most remorse- 
less in their mendacity.” 

“ You seem to love them.” 

“You speak the fact without intending it. I do love 
them ; and so will you.” 

“Never.” * * 

“ Yes; for you will not find them out, or, doing so, will 
forget the monitions of experience in the gratification of 
your tastes ; precisely as you do now.” 

“ O Philos' ! ” 

“ It is impossible to see a creature so fair as is a Philau- 
tian, so manlike, and not admire him, and so candid, appar- 
ently, with his full blue eyes and glistening teeth, and not 
love him ; but, when you get into the interior of the whited 

sepulchre Therefore, wait till you have sounded the 

depths of this Minnchen.” 

“I will — for your sake, and to triumph.” 

“ I hope so, and for my sake. I should like for once to be- 
lieve in what I see. But when you do ” 

“What then?” 

“ Then have her cut in marble, and carve upon the plinth : 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


71 


This is pure Truth , come upward from the Well , and that Hon- 
esty which was groped for with a lantern in daylight .” 

“ Incorrigible ! ” cried Alethi smiling. He then added, 
suddenly : “Were you ever in love, Philos' ? ” 

“ In love ? With what ? With an apple-dumpling, or a 
cheese-tart ? ” 

“Neither, but a more delectable kind of confectionery, 
kisses say, and ladies-fingers.” 

“ Yes, when I could swallow them at a mouthful and have 
done with them.” 

“ But not with the kind that produce heartburn.” 

“ No, they go against my stomach. Love ! Don’t I look 
like a Cupid ? ” added the schoolmaster, with an inimitable 
contortion that was meant perhaps for a caricature of an 
ogle or a leer. “ But I’ll tell you. I was once.” 

“ What, really, bona-fide ? ” 

“ Yes, but not oyer head and ears. I stuck at the occiput.” 

“ And so did not fall in. It was a mercy,” quoth Ale- 
tliitheras, looking rather wicked. 

“ It was, as you shall hear. Sit down to the lesson.” 

“ Is it long ? ” asked Alethi, disposing himself. 

“ No, I made short work of it,” replied the pedagogue. 
“You remember the parson’s longnosed daughter at Me- 
damou ? ” 

“What! that yinegar-visaged, five-feet-len damsel, hight 
Mehetabel?” 

“ The same ; though I should rather have likened her to 
mustard.” 

“ In a pepperbox, then.'’ 

“ Yes, with its sugar-loaf coyer punched full of holes ; for 
she had had the smallpox.” 

“ What could possess you to make love to such a church 
steeple ? ” 

“ The ingenious piece of mechanism that was inside, which 
I thought would have measured the hours for me delightfully.” 




72 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

“ Love found a sun-dial once in the shade.” 

“ If you like ; but that was n’t it. I courted lier brain 
and not lier beauty ; and besides, having some regard for 
posterity, I thought to improve the breed on both sides.” 

“ That was generous, at least.” 

“ It was provident. Moreover, she would have helped me 
in my school.” 

“Well, and how did you get on ? ” 

“ Get off, you mean. She measured me, for full five min- 
utes, from head to feet with her two green eyes, and told me 
to go and consult the formulary and see if I was capable of 
fulfilling the purposes of matrimony there set down. I did so, 
and came back and told her that I thought I was fully. She 
thereupon told me that I might be, but that she had no idea 
of being a mother of toadstools, and turned her back.” 

“ And what did you say to that?” said Alethi, not daring 
to look at the monstrous head which had suggested the lady’s 
disagreeable metaphor. 

“ I said, that a productive fungus was better than a sterile 
excrescence, and wishing she might ever remain in the single- 
ness of a blessed virginity, turned my back and whistled. 
So we walked off, dos-a-dos .” 


OF ALETHITHERA8. 


73 


CHAPTER X. 

The Artist who worked without models. 

They were one day looking at a picture of a noble 
young lady, who, maddened by the most monstrous of all 
outrages, helped to murder her own father. 

“ What do you think of it ? ” asked Alethi. 

“ Of the painting, or the subject?” 

“ Of the subject.” 

“ One crime does not justify another. And, as it is writ- 
ten in a Book I have much read since among this people, 
‘ Vengeance is mine ; I will repay, saith the Lord.’ ” 

Alethi looked at his companion, who was not wont to 
quote in that manner, with some surprise. “ But surely you 
pity her ? ” 

“ I pity her from my heart; but I condemn.” 

They turned from the window in whose embrasure hung 
the picture, and observed, at another part of the gallery, a 
young artist who was copying a larger painting of less value 
and renown, and whose rapid yet careful manipulation ar- 
rested the traveler’s attention. His fingers, which like his 
undersized body were delicate as a woman’s, played with in- 
finite grace over the surface of his canvas, but never with a 
hasty or indifferent touch. On the contrary, it was evident 
that he thought as he labored, and studied while he did the 
handiwork of a simple imitator. As Alethi watched him 
from a not obtrusive distance, one of his pencils chopped. 

4 


74 


TRAVELS B V SEA AND LAND 


To prevent his getting down from his high stool, our traveler 
stooped, and picking up the pencil handed it to him with a 
slight bow. Blushing like a girl, the young man, w r ho w'as 
almost as handsome as a girl, murmured his excuses in an 
accent that -was not of the country, and, when Alethi re- 
sponded thatwdiat an emperor had once done to honor genius 
in the art was not too much for a private man who was per- 
mitted to admire facility like his, the youth became so em- 
barrassed, that, to restore the equanimity which was needed 
for his task, Alethi ventured to ask him if he pursued that 
work as a lesson, or merely to fulfil a commission. 

“ To fulfil a commission,” said the artist with a very mourn- 
ful look, and turning, with what the traveler fancied was 
disdain, his back upon the model. 

“ So I should think,” said Alethi ; “but Pardon; we 

interrupt you.” 

“ Not at all. I am glad to have a respite ; and in fact,” 
( looking out upon the sky, ) “ it is almost time that I should 
leave off. — I beg you will not hesitate to talk,” he con- 
tinued, while he proceeded to put aside his materials and 
otherwise prepared to suspend his labor: “it is so long 
since I have had anybody to converse with, it is grateful ; 
and — will you pardon me in turn ? I should think you are 
strangers here like myself.” 

All this was well said, and in good Anastesian. 

“We are,” replied Alethi; “travelers from a far land. 
You are not an Alectryon ? ” 

“ No, I am of Vesputia.” 

“ From the great republic there ? ” inquired Philosc. 

“ Yes, an Isopoliteian,” replied the artist with a smile. 

“ That is, with us, no disadvantage,” remarked Alethi. 
“ I suppose you are here for study.” 

“ Yes, but I almost repent of it.” 

“ Indeed ? That is rather strange.” 

“ Why so ? I find myself, despite myself, laboring to catch 


OP ALETHITHEKAS, 


75 


the manner of others, and to reflect, so to speak, their soul. 
This, if not servile, is at least dangerous. I feel it is so, I 
mean, who — may I dare to say it ? was not, I think, bora 
to ape even artists like to these. The same light which gives 
us color, the same shadow which. renders form and expres- 
sion, are for me as they -were for them. Why then should I 
measure out their breadth, elaborate their effect, and dabble 
in their tints, instead of being guided by my own discern- 
ment and my own taste, not to speak of following inch by 
inch the line of their designs and mimicking the very absur- 
dities or extravagancies of their compositions, which are 
often, as you see,” ( and he swept his hand carelessly, with- 
out looking in its direction, first to the right side then to the 
left, ) “ full of unnaturalness and of absolutely impossible 
incongruities. I sometimes feel, as now, that I could break 
my pencils and my colorboard and trample these dead pig- 
ments in the dust.” As he spoke, his fine hazel eyes sparkled 
proudly and scornfully under the broad leaf of his drooping 
felt hat, the beautifully brown moustache rose closer to his 
nostrils, and his cheeks, which were shaded with one of 
those beards which grow lighter at the inner side and deepen 
at the ears, making thus a harmony of tone that is itself a 
beauty and artistic, glow r ed ruddy as an Indian’s in the light 
of sunset. He closed the lock of his box with a kind of 
passion, then passed his dainty hand over the beard of his 
chin, which -was lighter than the rest and worn as artists 
love to wear it, but not always so well as he, who, choosing 
so to -wear it, let his hair grow also long, its dark browm 
ringlets curling to the slope between his uncovered neck and 
his shoulders. He evidently -waited for the travelers to 
leave. But Alethi felt a yearning to the handsome painter, 
and pursued : 

“ And why then do you ? ” 

“ Because ” He hesitated for a moment. “ You 

know how r it is with us fellows,” he resumed in a lighter 


76 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


tone ; “ we cannot always choose. While we study, we must 
earn the means to live. And were I boldly to reject commis- 
sions such as this, and run the risk of failure in the path that 
I am ambitious to enter and vain enough to think I was 
made to pursue, where am I to find my models ? We cannot 
guess at nature. Yet I have tried to do it for seven long 
years. And O the toil, the anguish often, of groping in the 
dark for what my memory did not serve me with and what I 
had no chance to buy.” 

“ Surely, here in Ariospolis ” 

“ There are enough ; but they are professional. They sit 
for every painter, and are little more than animated laymen, 
with countenances that their trade has deprived of every- 
thing natural.” 

A sudden thought flashed over Alethi’s mind. He hesi- 
tated, changing complexion as quickly and completely as 
the artist, then said: “Perhaps I can fit you. Will you 
paint for me ? ” The artist looked at him. “ Come dine 
with me to-day,” said Alethi. “ There is my address. Per- 
haps we shall be able to arrange matters so as to gratify in 
the highest degree both you and myself. Come, you will not 
refuse me.” The artist gave 1ms card. “At four o’clock. 
Will that suit you ? ” 

“ O, with thanks,” said the young man, lifting his hat. 
But Alethi, after raising his own, put out his hand, and 
pressed the small fingers of the painter in his nervous and 
hearty grasp. 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


77 


CHAPTER XI. 

MinncherCs picture, and what came of it. The Schoolmaster 
philosophizes thereon. 

Minnchen sat to the artist. She sat in her Maurusian 
dress, which with a trifling alteration suited well a damsel 
of Mesopotamia, and sat as Betliuel’s daughter at the Well, — 
a familiar subject, but which Hilarius, the artist, proposed 
to treat in a novel mode. Alethi consented to serve as the 
patriarchal messenger. Philoscommon had taken great pleas- 
ure in offering himself for this part, as ethically more proper 
he observed, Alethi being the veritable Isaac, who should 
keep in the invisible background of Canaan. The philoso- 
pher pressed the point with apparent earnestness, putting 
himself into various postures which were perfectly delectable 
but pronounced too grandiose, and finally offered modestly to 
let Hilarius make a dromedary of him if he wanted, or two 
camels, or anything he liked but a eunuch. 

When the design was completed, which pleased Alethi 
well, the latter insisted upon advancing a handsome sum to 
the painter, to secure, as he said, the picture for himself, and 
engaged moreover, that, simultaneously with the colored 
sketch which he was to make of it, Minnchen’s head should 
be accurately done on panel the size of life. 

Hilarius worked with uncommon zeal, and Minnchen 
seemed herself to sit to him with pleasure. Alethi generally 
accompanied her, sometimes he left her and returned for her, 


78 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

and sometimes, at liis desire, slie went alone. Pliiloscommon, 
once or twice, expressed Lis wonder at this confidence ; but 
tlie younger traveler, who in Lis proneness to form attach- 
ments had conceived a warm friendship for the artist, would 
not listen. 

Two months had elapsed, the season was becoming un- 
wholesome in Ariospolis, and the portrait was already suffi- 
ciently completed for the artist to commence upon the figure 
of Rebecca, when one morning, on calling for Minnchen at 
her lodging, he learned from the aunt, who seemed in great 
alarm, that Minnchen had not been seen since the preceding 
evening. 

Alethi flew to the artist’s study. The door was locked. 
The landlord, opening it, said he believed his tenant was 
gone to the country. All of the art-furniture that was easily 
moveable had disappeared from the room. Minnchen’s por- 
trait was gone, and the sketch for the picture, but the larger 
canvas with its outline monochrome stood yet upon the easel 
and the rest-stick leaning against one of the pins. 

Alethi did not storm, nor wring his hands. He stood 
motionless for several minutes, then recollecting himself, and 
finding the man’s eyes fixed upon him with a kind of mali- 
cious satisfaction, as if enjoying his confusion, departed with- 
out a word. 

When he got to his own lodgings, Pliiloscommon met him 
at the door, but, looking at him, instantly disappeared. It 
was two hours before he returned, and he saw his friend 
walking up and down the sitting-room with a very haggard 
look, as if he had not slept for nights. Philos' turned his 
head away, and said, “ I will come in presently, Alethi, when 
you are more composed.” 

“No,” said Alethi, grasping his hand and pressing it till 
it ached. “ You know all then ? ” 

“ No ; I but conceive it.” 

“ Ah, you were right.” 


OP ALETHI THERAS. 


79 


“ Of course. What else could you expect ? But let us 
drop the subject till to-morrow.” 

“Fear not; I can discuss it now. I have reason to be 

glad that I am rid, before it was too late, of such a ” 

He stopped ; then abruptly, “ What did you mean by what 
could I expect ? ” 

“ You are in trouble now, my clear Alethi.” 

“ No matter ; I can partly guess your meaning : let me 
hear it.” 

“But positively I will not answer now. Let one night 
pass over. Then ask me to-morrow, and I will resume where 
I left off. Let us meantime prepare to leave this place.” 

“ O yes, at once.” 

The preparations for departure were a good diversion, as 
Philoscommon foresaw they would be, and, when the morrow 
came, he put off further question till they were actually on 
their way to Parthenope, till indeed they had reached their 
first stopping-place. It was then, at the inn where they sup- 
ped, that Alethi who seemed to have recovered his serenity, 
though he was very serious, renewed the subject. 

“ And now, Philos', my dear old wisehead, whom I ought 
to have minded better,” ( Alethi took both his clumsy hands, ) 
“ what did you mean, yesterday ? ” 

“ To remind you of the proverb of the purse and ear. I 
smelt misconduct in her origin.” 

“ What ! do you believe in birth ? ” 

“ Who have so little of it ? Undoubtedly. Are not men 
and women animals? Would any but a fool buy ahorse 
without knowing his pedigree, or overlook the blood-charac- 
teristics of his sheep or his cattle ? ” 

“ I thought you set at nought all aristocratic pretensions ? ” 

“ Pretensions, certainly, but not aristocratic qualities, where 
real. It is not easy for a man to say who his father is, for his 
mother’s chastity must be always problematical.” — Alethi 
opened his eyes in amazement ; Philoscommon drew up the 


80 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


lower lids of his own only the more. “ Not to the husband ; 
he never doubts it — till he is compelled to,” he resumed ; 
“ but to such fellows as you.” 

“ The devil ! do you take me for ? ” 

“ A marital-honor robber ? No ; but for one of those who 
may find women false, if they choose to have them so. Chas- 
tity, my dear fellow, as nobody should know better than a 
man of your nose and legs, is not more common than other 
virtues, though its absence, like that of other virtues, is not 
one time in ten thousand suspected, even where it has ten 
times gone astray, in the spirit if not in the flesh. But 
where was I, when you led me into this commentary on 
genesis ? ” 

“ Calling in question your own paternity.” 

“ Ah, are you there ? Well, the shoe will fit me as others, 
though, if you had seen my mother’s husband, you never 
would have doubted where I got this pompion head. — 
I say, or meant to say, that though one cannot often be sure 
that there is no cross in the breed, yet it is easy to tell, 
when you know a man’s ancestors, what, under certain cir- 
cumstances, his course will be. Minnchen’s father was ( I sup- 
pose) a Leipoderm of Abyla, and her mother for a Gentile 
could have been no great things or she had hardly given him 
the chance to make a mother of her. Their habits of life 
were sordid, and all their associations vulgar. What could 
you ? ” 

“ Stop ! ” cried Alethi. “ It is bad enough to have passed 
through the torture ; don’t explain to me the machinery of 
the rack.” 

“ No, my dear fellow. But as it has left those magnificent 
limbs whole, and I am sure, despite its straining, that gallant 
heart quite sound, there is a chance for the fairhaired girl you 
left in Medamou. She has at least six good generations in 
her family-record, and something as respectable in the books 
of banks and other stock-companies.” 


OP ALETHITHEE AS. 


81 


“ You are a fool,” said Alethi, blushing and smiling de- 
spite of himself. 

“ That is the very reason why I would not have you so,” 
returned his companion, putting himself in the first dancing- 
position and bending his hams ; “ one is enough for pleasant 
company.” 


CHAPTER XII. 

They visit the scene of an earthquake. On the way the 
Schoolmaster tells a history . Carradora. 

Alethi could not however so easily forget his loss, and on 
one occasion he reopened the subject. 

It was some weeks since their arrival at PartlienopA They 
had set out to visit the scene of an earthquake which had 
occurred the night before, and had been attended with some 
loss of life as well as destruction of property. The younger 
traveler had fallen into a revery. After a long silence, watched 
patiently by Philoscommon, he said, without lifting his eyes 
from the floor of the open carriage : 

“That girl’s — conduct, is unaccountable. I cannot get 
her out of my head.” 

“You meant to say, her ingratitude,” said the school- 
master. ^ 

“How did you know that ?” returned Alethi surprised. 

“ Because,” said the other, “ you hesitated. Generous na- 
tures feel a sort of shame in mentioning their own benefac- 
tions, and never reproach others with what they have done 
for them, though they often long to.” 

“Well, admit it, my (Edipus; is it not an extraordinary 
case ? ” 

“ That you who are most worthy to be loved should be 
1 * 


82 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND 


LAND 


disregarded for one wlio is greatly less so ? Not at all. Does 
your own mother love you best of all her sons ? ” 

“You have heard me say she does not.” 

“Yet you have loaded her daily, hourly with proofs of 
your affection, while those she prefers give no evidence of 
filial sensibility. And the more you show you love her, the 
more, without intending it, she wirings your heart, as the less 
regard your brothers pay to her the closer she clings to them. 
There you are answered. The case is a plain one.” 

“You mean then to tell me ? ” 

“ If you are so dull as to need an explanation, that not 
only is love rather the result of caprice and accident than of 
real sympathy or considerate judgment, but superiority on 
one side is apt in many cases to engender anything but admi- 
ration on the other, while everywhere, where reciprocal love 
does not exist, the continued efforts of the loving party to 
excite the affection of the loved only tend to alienate her 
the more, because not only she wearies of them, but they 
convict her before her own conscience, and that is not pleas- 
ant to self-love, which must everywhere be propitiated ; and 
lastly, because the exertion to win her but proves that she 
herself has won, and secure in her conquest she grows more 
indifferent, while for the inverse reason she heaps her caresses 
on those whom she hopes, and hopes the more that she always 
fails, to win.” 

“You may be right,” quoth Alethi, sighing; “but it is 
hard.” 

“ I did not make the world,” replied Philoscommon drily. 
“ Now did it never occur to you, that by playing the indif- 
ferent you might have succeeded better — with your mother 
I mean, amiable and every way estimable that she is? for you 
prospered well enough with Minnclien, till the artist came.” 

“ Spare me. — Yes ; but ” 

“ You never had the heart to try, or at least to repeat the 
experiment — for I dare say you did try it. All men do 


OP ALETHITHEIIAS. 


83 


occasionally — wlien in a bad liumor. It is your own fault 
entirely — no, not entirely, but in a great measure. Men of 
your heart spoil women, who, when petted, always pout. 
Let me tell you a story, and a true one ; though it is apropos 
of a fool, and not of a man of sense. But men of sense and 
fools are much on a par in affairs of the heart. A very fine 
woman, who was a dear friend of my grandmother’s ( you 
see it was pretty long ago, ) was persuaded by her parents to 
wed a wealthy man whom she could not bring herself to like. 
She even told him so before the engagement; but he per- 
sisted, thinking — for he was a fool — that by and by she 
would come to love him, seeing how he doted upon her. 
She led him a dog’s life ; and the more he labored to please 
her, the more she seemed to hold him in aversion.” 

“ She probably was secretly in love with another.” 

“ Perhaps so. But it was never so supposed ; and I think, 
had there been a fire in anyway, its light had shone through 
some crevice, at least for my grandmother’s eyes, which were 
sharp ones. One day, when the friends were in a room to- 
gether, the husband came in with a rouleau of gold pieces 
which he had just received from some substantial tenant. 
Not regarding my grandmother’s presence, or perhaps only 
the more therefore, for ostentation is at all times apt to be 
uppermost, especially in fools’ breasts, and even the generous 
have no aversion to be found out, — he poured the entire 
roll into his lady’s lap, who thereupon slowly rose, and lift- 
ing her lap with icy indifference let the whole contents roll 
over the floor.” 

“ She was ! ” exclaimed Alethi. 

“ Not a monster. She was simply an — ungrateful woman. 
But what would you have ? She had no heart for Mm.” 

“ She might have spared him though before her friend’s 
face.” 

“True enough; but what mattered such a scratch in pub- 
lic, when she excoriated him daily in private ? But I have 


84 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


not tolcl you all. Slie said, as the money fell to the floor, ‘ It 
is not gold, Onetus, will buy my love.’ You see she had some 
cause, or thought so, for her aversion.” 

“But she should have stuck to her bargain. Why did 
she marry him ? ” 

“ It was one on both sides. Did he not take her too, for 
better, for worse ? — Well, they had one child. And the 
poor woman’s heart seemed to open for the little thing that 
did not knock at it so loudly and importunately as did the 
father. But it soon withered. And when the solitary flower 
•was laid in its last bed to mingle with the air and dust that 
w T ere its elements, the hapless mother went down into the 
vault, and kneeling on the pavement prayed earnestly that she 
might soon follow it. And she did. — But, bless me ! this is 
melancholy talk.” The little man sprung up briskly, as if to 
shake off the unpleasant subject ; but almost immediately 
he added, in a graver tone, “And here we have the melan- 
choly in effect.” 

They were come indeed before the scene of the catas- 
trophe. 

There was no fissure of the ground, no sign of any cause 
of the misfortune ; but the village was full of ruins ; houses 
fallen, or so shattered as to seem to threaten fall, and, through 
piles of stones and crumbled mortar and broken timber, men 
and women, dust and dirt begrimed, were bearing off their 
battered furniture or laboring to extricate it from the incum- 
bent rubbish, while others stood or squatted near, with coun- 
tenances full of despair, gaping on the desolation of their 
homes and the ruin of their little all, others tending some 
wounded relative, or friend, or neighbor, while again a party 
of four men were bearing off a dead body. Crowds of spec- 
tators, more or less sad, and all silent, were gazing on the 
scene. Everywhere ruin, misery, physical suffering, sorrow, 
curiosity. 

The two travelers passed silent and sympathetic through 


OF ALETHITHEBAS, 


85 


the crowd. Aletlii approached one group, a family that sat 
benumbed with grief and helpless, — spoke to them, asked 
if he could aid them, — received a sorrowful denial in a 
single motion of the hand of the principal person, who how- 
ever accepted, but still in silence, a considerable alms, kiss- 
ing earnestly the hand that gave it, which Alethi drew quick- 
ly away, — then made his way hastily to the extremity of 
the place, where were but few persons. Here he turned 
about to look once more upon the scene, and saw, a little 
apart, sitting on the ground with her back to a large stone 
and holding something in her lap, a woman of rare beauty ; 
so rare indeed that it alone would have arrested him. But 
she was dressed like the people of the village, and her face 
was almost stony with what might not be termed, in its im- 
passiveness, despair, but was the torpor, the anaesthesia of 
utter wo. 

Alethitheras, exchanging looks with his companion, whose 
own visage showed unwonted seriousness, hesitated whether 
to approach the woman or not ; but, as he stood irresolute, 
to his surprise she looked up, met his gaze, and instantly her 
dead aspect became animate with interest. But it was mo- 
mentary, a flash of the lightning of an accustomed sensa- 
tion ; her eyes dropped, her face became as passionless, as 
cold, as stone-like as before. 

Alethi approached her, touched her shoulder. She moved, 
again looked up at him, now bending closely over her. “ Can 
I do anything for you ? ” he asked. “ Will you let me ? ” 

She met his eager and pitiful look with a penetrating gaze 
from her large black eyes, the power of whose transcendant 
beauty she seemed even in that moment to be aware of ; for, 
as if she read a mingled admiration with Alethi’s sympathy, 
her mouth lost its rigidity, a large tear dropped slowly on 
either pale but sunburned cheek, she shook her head, and 
turning down the skirt of her gown from the object that it 
covered in her lap, showed the body of a dead infant. 


80 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Alethi was inexpressibly shocked. Philoscommon himself 
stepped back. She saw the effect, and, covering again the 
infant, said, with a bitter smile : “ What could you do for 

me now ? Can you open its little eyes ? If I put its lips to 
my breast, will it suck ? ” 

There was passion in this utterance ; it was a language 
that became the poetry of the woman’s face, the unquenched 
ardor of her glorious eyes. 

“ But is this all that is of you? ” asked Alethi. She did 
not answer, lie sat down on the grass beside her. “ Have 
you nothing else to care for in the world ? ” He took her 
hand. Fine it was, — a model hand, though tanned and 
somewhat hard from work, and now soiled as was her dress. 
“ Where is the father of your child ? Where is your hus- 
band?” 

She turned her head, and pointed, with the other hand, 
behind her. Alethi dropped on the instant the one he held ; 
for there, unnoticed as yet by him, but not by Philoscommon, 
who was already beside it, lay not far from him the body of 
a man. 

“ Is he dead too ? ” 

“ No,” cried Philoscommon ; “ he breathes.” 

Alethi left the woman, forgot her. Together, the two 
friends raised the man. His arm was crushed ; he had lain 
there perhaps for several hours, and was senseless from ex- 
haustion and pain. 

“ Where shall we bear him ? ” said Philoscommon to the 
woman. 

“Where you will,” she answered: “is he not worse than 
dead ? Who is there will help us ? ” 

“ Is your house destroyed ? ” 

“No, we were not at home. Had we been, we were not 
wretched and ruined.” 

“ Where is it ? ” 

“Yonder.” 


OP ALETHITHEEAS. 


87 


“ Come then.” Slie stirred. “ Come,” said Alethi, going 
back to her, while he made a sign to his companion, who 
beckoned to two or three stout fellows who were drawing 
near : “ Come ; all will yet be well.” 

“Whither?” 

“To your home. We will bury your babe. Your hus- 
band we will cure.” 

“Will you come then with me ? ” she asked. 

“ Certainly ; nor will leave you till you are comfortable.” 

“ Do you say that truly ? ” She took Alethi’s hand and 
looked into his eyes. Reading there the confirmation he did 
not utter, she drew his hand, in the manner of her country, 
to her lips, kissed it fervently, said, “ Come then,” and 
stepped before him. 

blie was of a noble figure, as well as beautiful. As she 
walked, the short petticoat, bared by the upper dress she 
still held over her child, suffered her legs from the slope of 
the calf to be seen. Alethi had noticed them still more 
exposed when she sat, and observed then their symmetry. 
Her arms, brown, but fine of skin and round, corresponded 
with this part, and her hollow back, graceful hips, and well- 
formed head, which was covered with a scarlet cloth whose 
square ends drooped behind and hid her neck, made her tall 
figure very striking. Once she looked back, as if fearing 
that Alethi would not follow, then stepped up to the men 
who were already bearing off her husband, and saying some- 
thing in the dialect of the place which the traveler did not 
comprehend, preceded to the house. 

It was a little, low-roofed, gloomy dwelling of a single 
story, and two little rooms with unglazed windows even dis- 
proportionably small ; the floor of tiles, the furniture poor 
and scanty. There was a small stable beside the house ; 
and this, with a cart which stood without, seemed to indi- 
cate the occupation of the tenant, who was, as Philoscommon 
had ascertained, a carter or earner. 


88 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


The older traveler made the bearers wait till he had re- 
stored the man to consciousness, dressed temporarily his arm, 
and given him wine. He then recommended that he should 
be taken to a hospital. To everything the woman and the 
man assented. The man was borne away in his own cart, 
Philoscommon following in the carriage. Then Alethi took 
gently the dead baby from the woman’s arms, and going into 
the inner room laid it on a bed. She looked at him with 
eyes swimming in tears, suffered him to spread his handker- 
chief over it, heard him say she must have it buried at his 
expense, looked at him full again, her eyes through their 
glistening moisture showing a tenderness that made him 
thrill, then grasped his hand, and despite his efforts covered 
it with passionate kisses. 

“ Cease ! ” he cried : “ I do not like it. It is not the fashion 
of my country.” 

“ It is of mine ; to such as you. It ought to be of yours ; 
for such as you are angels.” 

“ Fi, fi ! ” 

“ I speak truly. I could worship you. O, were all men 
like you ! ” 

“ You will offend me What is your name ? ” 

“ Carradora, sir.” 

“ You will offend me, Carradora, if you persist. Sit down 
now, and be comforted. All will yet be well. If you want 
anything, my friend will supply the means when he re- 
turns.” 

“ But you are not going, sir ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Then I will do nothing, take nothing.” She sobbed, she 
wrung her hands. 

“ What is the matter ? ” 

“ I do not want to be treated as a beggar.” 

• c Do I treat you so, Carradora ? ” 

“ Yes. You wish to help me ; you have helped me, — like 


OP ALETHITHEIiAS. 


80 


a king ; but you want to go at once, without my thanks, and 
to forget me.” 

“Is that likely ? Will it console you, if I stay ? ” — her 
eyes sparkled — “ if I stay till my friend, who is sometimes 
my servant, for he will be so ” 

“ I do not wonder. It must be Heaven to serve you.” 

“ For a man, O Carradora ! ” She smiled, — smiled through 
her tears, — smiled coqucttislily, — at least Alethi thought 
so, — and smiled, O how beautifully ! It was the sunlight 
through a summer shower. 

“Well, Carradora, — and I am glad I have made you 
already more cheerful, — I will stay till he returns. How 
let us go back again to the other room. That bed with its 
little burden is too doleful.” 

He led the way himself. It was the kitchen and the par- 
lor. Carradora wiped the table off, drew to it a chair for 
him, which she also dusted, then hoped he would suffer her 
to leave him alone awhile, and went into the inner room, but, 
doubtless through deference, only partly closed the door be- 
tween. Through the space left, Alethi, without intending 
it, saw her go before a little mirror and arrange her head- 
dress, then retire and return with a wet towel and clean her 
face, taking very great pains ; and he thouglit__of the child 
that was on the bed behind her. She then withdrew again 
to the unseen part of the chamber, which was where the 
child lay, and when she re-entered the first room was clean 
and bright from head to foot. Had she lifted once the hand- 
kerchief he had laid upon the child ? 

She brought with her a bottle of wine, which she said was 
better than their accustomed drink, such as she had given to 
her wounded husband, though it was not so good as the 
gentleman was used to. Alethi poured some into a glass 
and drank a mouthful, and declining more, she raised the 
glass to her lips, and purposely taking the side that was next 
him and asking him first to permit her, drank what he had 


CO 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


left. He then inquired into the accident, which she described 
in expressive but artless language. 

“ We went to see the ruins. Becco — that is my husband 
— he took the child from me, to ease me. He looked into a 
door, and as he stood on the sill a beam fell on him, and 
knocked him down. My little babe — O my God ! ” She 
sobbed. Alethi, full of compassion, said not a word. Final- 
ly, when he took her hand, she wiped her eyes, and con- 
tinued. “ The poor thing fell under him ; and when I pulled 
her out ” 

“ No matter, Carradora ; never mind the rest.” 

“ But she was my first, my only one. Oh, to have it one 
moment smiling in your arms, and the next ” 

“ Hush, hush ! Ho not say any more.” 

But she went on to tell, how Becco staggered to the place 
where the travelers found him, and there fainted, and how 
there was none to help him at such a time, and how, over- 
wdielmed by this double misery, she had sat down, not know- 
ing what she did, and not caring, — and so on, on, till Alethi 
found she was forgetting child and husband, everything in 
the desire to captivate him. Uneasily, and she perceived it, 
and became herself anxious and dissatisfied, he watched for 
Philoscommon, and when the latter came felt as if he were 
to leave a prison. But all was not yet over. 

“ You will come again ? ” said Carradora. 

Alethi hesitated. Is the man well cared for ? ” he asked 
of Philoscommon. 

“ Surely.” 

“ What do they think of him ? ” 

“Poor fellow ! he must lose his arm.” 

The woman turned pale under her nutbrown skin, but ut- 
tered not a word. Alethi took her hand. “You must not 
be downhearted,” he said. “ Think how it might have been. 
And besides, it is the left arm. He will be able to maintain 
you, will he not ? ” 


OP ALETIITHERA8. 


91 


“ O yes, there are many poorer than ourselves.” 

“ If you want anything, Carradora ” 

“ Will you come again ? ” 

“ You will not need me.” 

“ Then I will take nothing, — nothing — nothing ! Will 
you come again ? ” 

Alethi, conscious of what was passing in Philoscommon’s 
mind, looked aside and read it in his face. “ You are wrong,” 
he said in their own tongue; “ I have been too lately scalded.” 

Carradora turned at the sound, with that searching look 
which eyes like hers, especially in women, give better for 
their beauty and their brightness. 

“My master says,” replied the pretended servant to the 
look, “ you make the place too hot for him. You must not 
press him so.” 

“ But will he come again ? ” 

“ Yes, I will,” replied Alethi. 

“ To-morrow ? ” 

“No.” 

“ The next day, then.” 

“ No.” 

“ Well, the next day after? ” 

“ No, I will not promise you for that.” 

“ Then it will be certainly the next ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ One, two, three, four. Four whole days with this ! But 
then you will come ? Truly ? ” 

“ Truly. — This to lay the baby in the earth.” 

“ No.” 

“ I will not come unless.” 

“ Then I will take it, anything.” 

“ Adieu.” He held out his hand. She took it, and again, 
to his great vexation, kissed it. 

“Adieu, adieu, sir,” she exclaimed with the most afFecting 
accents. “ Do not forget the poor Carradora.” 


92 


TBAYELS 


B Y 


SEA 


AND LAND 


CHAPTER XIII. 

Aletlii falls into a new peril of the heart. How he escaped , 
through the advice of the Schoolmaster. 

“ I wish he might,” said Philosc, as he followed his friend 
into the carriage. “ This is the old devil in a new form ; or 
worse than that, it is he of whom the Jesousian evangel tells, 
who has returned unto his house and 1 findeth it swept and 
garnished. Then goeth he and taketh to him seven other 
spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell 
there ; and the last state of that man is worse than the first.’ ” 

“ That is not good gospel for my case, Philos'. I told you 
my scalds were too recent, for me not to dread hot water.” 

“ Why then will you go near the kettle ? ” 

“ How can I avoid it ? I put off the day as far as I could. 
Her fancy — if she has one — will have worn off wdien I 
again see her.” 

“ And suppose it has not ? Suppose it has increased ? She 
is of a country and of a temper that threaten serious things. 
’Faith, I should not be surprised if she came after you, if 
you did not go to her.” 

“ So you see I must, whether I will or no. And I have 
promised ; which is enough.” 

“ And if you find her worse than before ? ” 

“ I do not think it. But if so, what shall I do, dear 
Philos' ? ” 


OF ALETHITHERA8, 


93 


“ How should I know ? I have not your experiences. Me- 
hetabel was my only love.” 

“Brayo!” cried Alethi, laughing. “But, however you 
got it, you do have knowledge of women, — though I fear 
not one of them would admit it. Plow shall I treat her ? ” 

“ Humph ! Let me think. Is she vain ? ” 

“ I think so.” 

“ You know so. You may be sure of it, or she had not so 
eagerly seized on you as an admirer. You see I do not allow 
anything for your six-foot stature, handsome legs, and unex- 
ceptionable mien.” 

“Well then ? But you are envious, you rogue.” 

“ I ? Indeed ! If I had but your inches, there is not a 
woman could look at my head with impunity. In fact, it 
was irresistible — in one way. “ But I forgive you. You 
want to know what to do. Well, make her some presents, 
and fill her topfull with self-admiration. You can leave her 
then to repentance.” 

“ Pshaw ! ” 

“ I am serious : try it. Ninety-nine women out of a hun- 
dred love themselves better than they do their best-loved 
admirer. Here is a sudden caprice. It may be as suddenly 
extinguished. Try it. If it give you but a day’s respite, we 
can leave Parthenope before she has time to wish you back. 
She will not hang herself.” 

That night, Alethi went to a private musical party. The 
entertainer, a fine old gentleman, after making all his friends 
happy and giving to every amateur his opportunity of dis- 
play, sat down himself, being urged thereto, to the piano, and 
played a long and difficult piece. He was overwhelmed with 
plaudits. One of the most rapturous of the hearers turned 
abruptly round to Alethi, and grinned broadly, in a way that 
expressed the utmost ridicule for the old gentleman’s efforts. 
Alethi, indignant, disgusted, outraged, looked severe, but 
said nothing, though he wished that Philoscommon could 


94 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


\ 


have been present to chastise in a proper way the insolent 
sycophant. Perhaps however his own silent reproof was bet- 
ter. And so Philosc assured him. 

“ But what would you have said, Philos' ? ” 

“ I should have asked the impertinent if that was part of 
the performance, as we were not promised a comedy, and of- 
fered to go and thank our host for the extra entertainment.” 
“ How that would have frightened him ! ” 

“ And my explanation, had he asked one, would have en- 
raged him. I should have told him, I suppose he enacted 
the buffoon of the old-time plays, who is foisted in to keep 
the major part of the audience from wearying of the wit 
they cannot understand.” 

“ I wish you had been there ! His malice, worse than his 
hypocrisy, deserved such castigation.” 

“ With your will then, I should carry with me everywhere 
a cat-o-nine-tails ; for where will you find a society in which 
there are not plenty of these pestilent malignants ? Do you 
forget the darkeyed man at Ariospolis who took the wall of 
you, and when you went to the outside of the narrow pave- 
ment, though it brought you on the left, smiled like a devil ? ” 
“ He was a fool. I did not anticipate his motive, or he 
would have had no triumph.” 

“ Then would you have been the fool. What matter, 
Alethi, the malice, the envy, the petty malignancy of such 
devils incarnate ? they lower but themselves in the eyes of 
the truer men they would depreciate. They cannot equal 
' these in good acts, or in the outside advantages of nature ; 
so they triumph over them in trifles that are never worth re- 
garding, and which no even temper w r ould be rufiled at find- 
ing disregarded. That man at Ariospolis, wflio probably 
mistook you for a Philautian, and hated you instinctively for 
your supposed rank and riches as well as for your better 
form and carriage, was but a sample of a large part of man- 
kind everywhere.” 


0 5 1 ALETHITHEKAS. 


95 


“ I shall never be used to them,” saijl Alethi, with a look 
of pain. 

“ Then you had better remained in Medamou.” 

When the morning was come for the visit to Carradora, 
our travelers had all things prepared for their departure from 
Parthenope. But the younger one must make the visit alone. 
As the little parcel for the rustic beauty was put into the 
carnage, he tried once more to persuade his companion to 
accompany him. The schoolmaster proved inexorable. 

“ In conferences of that nature,” he said, “ three interlocu- 
tors are one too many. Besides, ‘ Humani nihil a me alienum 
puto,’ — I confess an interest in knowing how she will act on 
the occasion ; an interest I cannot gratify except you be alone. 
But — be careful ! 

Xalenov to [ir] <jn?i7](j(u t 

as I used to hear my Medamousians, who knew nothing about 
it, recite. And for her ! 

Xa?iEKarepov tie navruv 

A-TTOTvyxavELv <j>i?iovvTa • 

there may be a scene.” 

Alethi shook his head, but smiled, flattered despite him- 
self ; for what man is not, at the mere idea of being loved by 
a beautiful woman ? Nay, we may go further ; to a man of 
naturally loving disposition, what is there so dangerous? 
Without beauty, a woman might gain much with such a 
nature, through his consciousness of her good opinion and 
amorous desire towards himself ; but, with beauty like Car- 
radora’s ! — Alethi did well to add, “ I will think on Minn- 
chen.” 

“ It will be,” said his friend, “ your only cuirass — for you. 
But for her, try the shawl.” 

“ And if she prove intractable.” 

“ Think of Potipliar’s wife, and leave with her your jacket 
also.” 


9G 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Carradora was at the door of her dwelling. Beautiful she 
looked and radiant with expectation. Striking her palms 
together, she rushed forward as if to act the part of a lackey 
at the carriage, but for some reason checked herself at the 
step. When Aletlii descended and put out his hand, she 
caught it in both hers and to his dismay pressed it twice 
against her heart, and would have held it there ; but, full of 
shame because of the presence of the coachman, our traveler 
seized the pretext of the parcel, and turning briskly round 
obliged her to resign it while he took the parcel from the 
vehicle. “ I have something for you,” he said, “ Carradora. 
But let us go into the house. — I have but a moment to 
stay,” he added, as they passed the sill. 

“Yet I have waited for you, O how many hours!” she 
replied with a tender reproach. 

“ That is not my fault. I am here on my day, and it is 
not yet high noon.” 

“ But I was in hopes you would change your mind and 
come before. I know I should have done so, had I promised 
you ; and you knew that I was waiting.” 

“ But how should I know or even fancy that ? ” 

“ O sir ! ” 

“ True, you are all alone now.” She was about to inter- 
rupt him. “ No matter, Carradora. Whatever the reason, I 
am sorry I should have kept you anxious. But I am come at 
last. And now, how is your husband ? ” 

“ He is doing very well, praised be the Virgin. For three 
whole days I have waited you and done little else but watch. 
It is such joy to have you here ! ” Again the reluctant hand 
is seized, to be carried again to the heart, whose tumultuous 
beating the woman wished perhaps that he should feel ; but 
Alethi drew it hastily away, and proceeding to unroll his 
parcel said, “You will see that I have thought of you as well. 
Here are some little keepsakes that will make you mindful 
of me, when I am away.” 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


97 


She pushed the parcel aside, and took one of his hands, 
which he had not the heart to tear from her. “ Do you mean 
that ? ” she said, with anxiety in all her face, that did not 
lessen, or but little its beauty, but merely changed its char- 
acter. Her features were too regular to be distorted, and 
the partial knitting and inward elevation of the long dark 
brows but gave a grandeur to the sorrow which made pathet- 
ical the earnestness of her unequaled eyes. “ Are you indeed 
going ? after all ? ” 

“ All what, Carradora ? I have given you no cause to 
think otherwise. Am I not a stranger ? ” 

“Yes, yes. You will go sometime: I know that well; I 
did forget it. But you will not go so soon ? Say you will 
not.” 

There came, that moment, into Carradora’s eyes, those 
matchless eyes, a look which made the fine nerves of the trav- 
eler quiver with a thrill that in its momentary intensity was 
almost painful, even while exquisitely pleasurable. It was 
well for him that look reminded him of Minnchen. He had 
forgotten Potiphar’s wife completely. Without answering, 
he drew the parcel to him and completed the opening of it. 
There appeared within two packages, one very much larger 
than the other, and on the top of this latter a paper box such 
ns is used by jewelers. Alethi undid this, and took out a 
pair of large earrings of gold filagree. They were not unlike 
those he had seen Minnchen wear in the church at Libur- 
num. He had indeed chosen them on that account, and 
they now helped his recollection of all that fickle girl had 
made him suffer. Looking on Carradora as he lifted them, 
he saw she was attracted and became excited by a new long- 
ing. 

“ You are a fine creature,” he said, “ Carradora. But” - 

She did not let him finish. She -ceased to look at the 
earrings. “ Why then do you go so soon ? ” she said. 

“ What has that to do with it ? ” 

5 


98 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ A great deal, I should think,” she answered with a readi- 
ness that surprised him, though the common women of her 
country, he knew well, are not unapt. “ When we admire 
anything, We do not care to go from it.” 

“ But, when we cannot get it ? ” 

“ But, when we can get it ? ” 

Alethi did not choose to look into her eyes for explication. 
“ You put me out,” he said. “ I was about to tell you, that 
you are very handsome, but would look still better with 
these ornaments than with the simple rings you wear.” He 
held the trinkets before her face. It was but natural she 
should be dazzled. 

“ But you must put them in for me.” 

“ No, I should hurt you.” 

“Try.” 

“ Nonsense.” 

“Very well, then you can put them back.” 

“ Really ? Well, take out those wires, and I will try.” 

She unhooked the old rings and removed them. Alethi, 
with some trouble, and not a little nervousness as his fingers 
moved over the soft lobe of her well-formed, but not small 
ears ( for her nose was long, though perfectly feminine, ) suc- 
ceeded in placing and securing, to Carradora’s great satisfac- 
tion, the large but unsubstantial pendants. The pleasure 
she had seemed to feel in being thus fingered by him, gave 
way to a livelier delight when hurrying to the other room 
she looked into the glass. She was indeed charming. 

“Now,” said Alethi, repeating the blow, “let us try the 
pin.” She stood as if expecting him to place it. “ No,” he 
said, “ I will not put in the brooch.” 

“ Yes.” 

“ No, Carradora ; no, most positively.” 

“ Ah,” she said, “ you, are not like my countrymen. Where 
are you from ? ” 

“ From Medamcu.” 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


99 


“ And where is that ? ” 

• “ The only place, according to the big-topped friend you 

saw with me, where the people do not stand upon their 
heads.” 

“ Then he can’t belong to it,” said Carradora, laughing 
lightly, while she began to unhitch the pin of the brooch ; 
“ for I should think he was just made to stand on his. He 
would not tumble over.” 

“ No,” said Alethi. “ He is solider in his upper works 
than most men.” 

She did not understand his true meaning ; but it did not 
matter. The pin was put in. 

“By the by,” said Alethi, as he watched the village 
beauty, earringed and brooched, surveying herself in the 
lookingglass, “ how readily I understand you, Carradora. 
You don’t talk like the people of these parts.” 

“ No, I am of Ariospolis,” she answered with a new ela- 
tion. “Becco, the stupid fellow, belongs here.” With an- 
other long and satisfactory look she turned from the mirror. 
Alethi had brought into the inner room the parcel -with him. 
He now saw her eyes turn anxiously to the two packages 
that were yet unfolded. He set the smaller one aside. 

“ That,” he said, “is of some useful little things that you 
can look over at another time. Here, Carradora, is something 
that I long to see around you.” He undid the shawl. In 
its purchase, Philoscommon had recommended the gayest 
colors ; Alethi’s tastes directed otherwise ; but, yielding to 
the suggestion that the uncultivated woman would not ap- 
preciate a refined selection, he had compromised the matter 
by choosing something between the two. The shawl was 
gay, but not vulgar, nor more than modest. He threw it 
round her shoulders, watching her expression in the glass. 

“ Fold it closer,” she said. “ Closer yet. You seem afraid 
to touch me. I am not dirty.” 

“ Fi, Carradora ! ” 


100 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“You are the strangest gentleman ! Will it do you any 
harm to wrap it round me ? Your own gift too? O, it is 
splendid ! ” she exclaimed, as he fell back from her and she 
gazed upon the glass, holding herself the folds together over 
her shapely bust. “ I look almost like a princess.” 

She suddenly turned, darted to him with an expression of 
the liveliest transport, and was about to kiss him, on the very 
mouth. Alethi drew back again. 

“ No, no, Carradora, not in that way. What would your 
husband say ? ” She looked amazed, as at first she had seemed 
pained. 

“ What should he say ? Isn’t it right ? How am I to 
thank you ? Becco would say I was a beast, if I did not. 
And for such a gift ! ” gathering up the shawl, which had 
fallen from her shoulders. 

“ Give me then a trifle in return. A ring, if you have one, 
or the earrings you have removed.” 

Eagerly, she opened a drawer in a little bureau near the 
bed, and took from it a small round paper box. Therein, 
imbedded in cotton wool, was a plain gold ring. “ Can you 
wear this ? ” she asked, handing it, but slowly and thought- 
fully to Alethi. He put it readily on his little finger. 

“ It is not your wedding-ring ? ” he said. 

“ O no, that is here,” — extending him her left hand, which 
he did not however take. “ The ring I give you was my first 
present from my earliest sweetheart. I was then but sixteen. 
It was too large for any but my forefinger.” 

“ You will regret it.” 

“ No, he is dead long since. And besides But will you 

wear it ? Truly ? ” 

“Yes, Carradora, — certainly for some time, — and will 
always keep it, precisely as you have kept it. I will write 
upon the box the date and place, besides your name, and it 
will be a reminiscence of our acquaintance, of your beauty, 
and your kindness.” 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


101 


“ No, of yours, if you will not say more. But you are not 
going now ? no, no, not now ? ” Her eyes, those grand and 
beautiful eyes, filled to the brim ; but the cup did not run 
over. 

“ Yes, I must.” 

“ But not for good ? You will be back again ? ” 

“ Perhaps not. We travelers cannot always be sure before- 
hand of our movements.” The cup ran over. 

“ O Carradora ! ” He put his left arm round her, over the 
shawl ; he staunched with his handkerchief the tears upon 
her cheeks. “ Look ! ” he said, “ look, Carradora dear, you 
are spoiling those grand eyes. You scarce can see now, 
through their moisture, how well you look. You will stain 
your shawl. Don’t let me take away with me the memory of 
your sorrow, Carradora mine, CarradorPna.” As he pro- 
nounced this diminutive of affection and familiarity, gazing 
on her as on a weeping child, his breast upon her shoulder 
and his face brought round close upon hers, Alethi touched 
gently, as he would a child’s, familiarly and with affection, 
her warm cheek with his lips. She smiled through her tears, 
flattered, soothed, perhaps made hopeful, and turning the 
eyes whose magnitude he had extolled full on him, with their 
beauty brightened if possible by the shower, and made dan- 
gerously fascinating by the expression of her feelings and by 
his position, as he stood thus, almost holding her in his arms, 
she said : “ But you will come again ? some day ? when 
you return ? ” 

“ If I return, dear Carradora, I will come ; that I truly 
promise. Now, let us part. See, how those rings become 
you ! ” He turned her face from him to the glass. She looked 
well satisfied ; she even turned her shoulder proudly to mark 
the richness and the graceful hanging of the shawl ; but, 
turning, she turned to him. 

“And will you go thus?” She put up her lips. “You 
have given me so much ; so much it almost bewilders me : 


102 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


give me but this, — it is so small a tiling, — but tliis to think 
on.” 

Alethi, half-conscious he was doing wrong, brought his 
own red lips into contact with hers ; but ere he could with- 
draw, putting her arm behind his shoulder, she kissed him 
twice lovingly and lingeringly. 

Extricating himself, with a burning cheek, burning with 
shame, not -pleasure, he escaped from the room. “ Good- 
bye,” he said, pointing to her ring on his finger: “I will 
remember you.” 

Carradora was about to cry ; but, as she followed him, her 
eyes turned to the little mirror. “ Ah ! ” she exclaimed, “ I 
shall not need your presents to remember you.” 

She followed him to the carriage, where the traveler gave 
his hand to her, which she kissed again with reverence and 
with gratitude. But she had the shawl about her, and the 
pendants glittered in her ears. The coachman noticed both, 
and, glancing at the traveler's reddened cheek, put his own 
construction on the interview. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

Love and self-love : a sermon on a Tciss. 

Alethi got back he knew not how ; he was in revery all 
the way. When he related his adventure, which he did 
faithfully and from beginning to end, Philoscommon, who 
had listened without interruption, and without remark, except 
the running comment and marginal notes of his elastic fea- 
tures can be considered such, until the close, rubbed down 
his knees and shins with his ugly palms, and finally, throw- 
ing himself back in his chair, said : “ You are not a miracle 
after all, as I began to think you, and the Patriarch in Kemi 


OF A I, E T II I T II E R A S . 


103 


must yet stand alone. But wliat made you recoil from the 
first temptation ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” replied Alethi, “ unless it was disgust to 
see that she thought more of herself after all than of me.” 

“Precisely so,” rejoined the schoolmaster: “she sprung 
to your neck from the lookingglass. It is with men of sen- 
sibility and discernment like you, in nine cases out of ten, 
the sole antidote to the poison of love. Women win us by 
flattering our self-love, — as we do them; they lose us by 
sacrificing that self-love to their own. Coxcombs and self- 
seekers see nothing but themselves ; but a man who has both 
sense and sensibility very soon discovers that a woman loves 
him not so much for himself as for her own sake ; that she 
has a preference for him only while he is present, but in his 
absence is ready to turn her vacant affections, or at least her 
unemployed attractions, to the first man who may be willing 
to be his successor. And this it is -which saves him, if a fine 
man like yourself, from ever becoming, through the flattery 
of a woman’s predilection, a coxcomb.” 

“You slanderer! you avenge upon the sex at large your 
injuries from Mehetabel.” 

“That is very well for a jest, Alethi ; but for the nonce I 
am serious. A famous tragic poet of the last century, — an 
Anastesian, by the by, — having, with the indifference to the 
marriage-tie so usual with his countrymen, had an amour 
with the wife of a Philautian noble, discovered to his 
chagrin that he was only playing second-fiddle (to use a vul- 
gar phrase ) to her husband’s groom.” 

“ Bah ! She was a common woman.” 

“ If you like. A philosopher of the same period, who had 
had a good deal to do with women, has said that ‘ to a com- 
mon woman every man is a man.’ How many of the sex 
then do you find that are un-common ? 

* Mgst women have no character at all,’ 
declares a poet who- knew the sex as well as he did his own, 


104 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


— though how the devil he got the knowledge, with his de- 
fective spine and spindle shanks, is more than men know — 
who never saw my pompion head and cockerel terminations.’* 

“ That too will do for a jest, Philos'. But, in fact, how the 
deuse did you-get your knowledge of the tender creatures ? ” 

“Tender in loin, you mean: they are not always so in 
heart. Do you admit I know them, eh? Well, perhaps I 
do. But how did I come by it? Not by my churchsteeple 
practice. I will tell you ; and it is another thing perhaps 
you have not thought of. 

“People talk, Alethi, of ‘experience* and ‘a knowledge 
of the world.’ All such knowledge, believe, is, — where it is 
not purely empirical, but what may claim to be philosophy, 

— almost, and always when in its perfection, purely intuitive. 
A man who is bom with this power of insight into human 
nature, — which I repeat is as much a physical sense ( a con- 
nate faculty of mental vision, so to call it ) as is the power of 
the external eye, — will see directly into characters and 
motives which have no transparency to ordinary men and 
escape their observation though they search for them for 
years. In his closet, with the telescope and microscope of 
his individual mind, the born observer explores, everywhere, 
on all sides of him, all that is of human nature, and finds 
nothing hidden. The world applauds him, yet talks all the 
same, although it never did and never will make its fore- 
most teachers in ethic knowledge of those who are aged, 
who have traveled, who mingle with the world. Of this fact,, 
the greatest poet of Philautia, who is generally, by the idola- 
try of his worshipers, termed ‘ the Master of Human Nature * 

— because, I suppose, he so often misuses her, is a prominent 
example. 

“ And so much for a sermon on a kiss.” 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


105 


CHAPTER XY. 

How the travelers left Parthenopd , hut got into the woods 
and were obliged to return. 

They left Parthenop6. But an adventure which they met 
upon their way obliged them almost immediately to return. 

They were alone together in the traveling-carriage. Sud- 
denly there was a stop. Six men, armed with muskets, were 
seen approaching from a wood. Alethi looked at his com- 
panion. “Banditti,” said the latter, shrugging his little 
shoulders. 

“ You take it easily,” said Alethi. 

“ ‘ Cantabit vacuus,’ ” replied the schoolmaster. “ But in 
fact, Alethi, there will be trouble enough about it without 
my forestalling it. See, it ’s beginning already ; that fellow 
orders us out.” 

“ I suppose there is no use of resisting ? ” 

“ The devil ! Six to one ? Perhaps with a dozen to back 
them ; and muskets too.” Philoscommon was already out, 
and now helped out his companion. 

“Follow,” said the bandit who had ordered them to 
descend. 

They stepped after him into the wood, Philoscommon try- 
ing to look serious, but only succeeding in being more ludi- 
crous ; three of the bandits followed, and the remaining two 
were left with the coach. 

“ We shall have no nightshirts to-night,” said Philosc, 
venturing to look back at the vehicle. 

5 * 


106 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ Keep your eyes before you,” cried one of the rear guard 
threateningly. 

“ And silence,” said impressively the man in front. 

After winding their way diagonally through a long piece 
of woods, they came to an open. Here the leader halted. 
“ You must submit,” he said civilly, “ to be bandaged.” 

“ What is that for ? ” asked Alethi. “ Can’t you settle 
with us here ? We shall not betray you.” 

“ I shall give you no opportunity,” said the man. “ But if 
you would be well-treated, ask no questions.” 

Requesting Alethi to give him his handkerchief, the leader 
bound his eyes. One of the others proceeded to do the 
same with Philosc. 

“I have no objections,” quoth the little man; “but it is 
buffoonery. We don’t know an inch of the country, if we 
had eyes on every side of us.” 

“ That head of yours is big enough to hold your tongue,” 
said the man who had before threatened him. “ See that you 
don't put it out again, or I will cut it off.” 

“ Which ? ” said Philoscommon. 

“ Both,” replied the bandit, tying the bandage so roughly, 
that his patient pushed him. “You are a little monster,” 
said the man angrily. “ I believe it will be better to take 
the head clean off you. Your legs will have then less weight 
to carry.” 

“ If you would only take a part of it, it might be of ser- 
vice in that way,” rejoined Philosc; “but if you take all, 
there will be nothing to bandage.” 

“Ho more of that!” cried the leader. “And you, my 
little umbrella-plant, if you are as wise as you are ugly, keep 
your jests till you are out of danger. Forward ! ” 

Something that felt very like the prick of a bayonet, but 
might have been but a pinch, was added to expedite the 
philosopher’s movement, who clapped a hand behind him 
very suddenly, and the whole party proceeded. 


OP ALETHITHEB AS, 


107 


The captives’ senses soon told them they had left the 
woods and were following a road. Presently was heard the 
rippling of water. They w r ere stopped, and made to mount 
the backs of two of the men, and were carried carefully over 
the stream. Soon after they were set down and had passed 
through another bit of woods, the captives were halted and 
their handkerchiefs removed. They found themselves in a 
small grassy open, beyond which at no great distance could 
be seen through the woods before them a country-road. Here 
they were desired to sit down, and the leader, standing up 
before them while his men appeared to watch the road, 
asked Alethi what he could give for his ransom. 

“ I cannot tell what are your expectations,” replied the 
captive. “ Name it yourself.” 

“ You are wealthy.” 

“ I am not.” 

“ But you have means.” 

“ I have.” 

“ And your companion ? ” 

“ Nothing.” 

“ Ten thousand gold pieces for you both,” said the brigand, 

“ It is impossible,” said Alethi. 

“ We will see to that,” rejoined the brigand, but with the 
same well-bred manner which had qualified his sternness 
throughout. “ You might as well submit at once as be 
detained for days.” 

Alethi appeared to hesitate. “ Good-bye to your travel, if 
you assent,” said Philoscommon in their own tongue. “ Offer 
the fellow five thousand.” 

“ Let your friend take his own counsel,” said the leader, 
looking at Philoscommon, “ unless you are advising him to 
what is best.” 

* Resting his musket on his arm, the bandit took from his 
pocket a blank-book and WTiting-materials. He was about 
handing them to Alethi, -when suddenly a low signal, some- 


108 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


thing like tlie call of a bird, was heard from the man near- 
est the road. The leader, without even a muttered oath, 
put back his writing-materials, and taking his musket in 
his right hand, seized with the other the arm of Alethi, and 
drew him up and after him into the woods again, obliging- 
Philoscommon with a sign to follow. After hurrying some 
steps in the direction of the length of the forest, a shot was. 
heard towards the road, then another. The brigand now 
swore deeply, halted and appeared to hesitate, looking for a 
moment menacingly at his captives. Several shots were now 
heard. “ Stay where you are, for your lives ! ” he said, and 
rushed back toward the road. 

In a few seconds, he came back again, looking haggard 
with desperation, demanded with a sign Alethi’s purse, which 
was handed to him, made another sign, of silence and of 
farewell, and darted forward, making scarcely a sound, though 
he sprang over bushes and dived under branches like a deer. 
But it was too late for him. Three soldiers rushed into the 
wood, asked the captives as they passed them in what direc- 
tion the robber had gone, to which neither Alethi nor Philos- 
common answered, then made after him. Presently a shot 
came, and the foremost of them fell. The two others paused 
an instant, then darted with a cry directly after the brigand. 
In a few moments two shots were heard together. And all 
was over. The soldiers returned unwounded, and Alethi, 
having handsomely requited them for getting him back his 
purse, was with his companion free. 

When they were again in the coach, but on their way back 
to Parthenop£, it was late in the afternoon. 

“That was a narrow escape for your money,” said Philos- 
common, “ and it cost six fellow T s their lives, — one of them 
a bad one though, who had no respect to my honor,” he 
added, as he rubbed himself on the seat. 

“ What a terrible country ! ” ejaculated Alethi thought- 
fully. 


OP ALETHITHERAS, 


109 


“Yes, that is the moral of it,” said the philosopher, “as 
well of my wound as of your captivity. You saw how well 
that leading one behaved.” 

“Yes, quite a gentleman, though stem,” said Alethi. “I 
could n’t bear to set the soldiers on his track.” 

“ Nor I. In truth, I believe I rather wanted him to escape, 
though that is quite contrary to ethics. But what conclusion 
do you draw from such a state of things in this old country, 
at this era of the world ? ” 

“ That, in despite of art and learning, civilization has gone 
backward.” 

“ But you say nothing of religion.” 

“ What do you mean ? ” 

“ I mean that it is not in despite of religion: for these fel- 
lows, unless I mistook their accent, were subjects of the hy- 
brid potentate who rules in Ariospolis ; and no doubt they 
were devout ones. While Anastasia is cut up into petty 
kingdoms, and a man may buy absolution for a murder and 
commit fresh sin, you can expect nothing better. Law here 
wants not its expounders, but it is destitute of all real effi- 
cacy, and the difficulty of obtaining a livelihood in a land 
where churches and priests absorb all the revenue, does the 
rest. It is only a wonder to me that every gay fellow in the 
country who loves adventure, has pluck, and is idle, is not a 
bandit.” 


110 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER X Y I. 

They visit the city of Deported Splendor , take a look at the 
Ptochalazons 1 and settle down in Monachopolis. 

They left ParthenopS, this time successfully. They came 
to the city of Necraugd, lying silent in its bed of waters, 
where pomp looks mournful and the numerous palaces have 
each its tale, too often tragical, of buried centuries, and with 
their ornate walls remind one, in their stained and weather- 
worn marbles, and faded paintings often done by famous 
hands, of a wealth and greatness long since departed. Here 
they saw the native citizen, sullen and dejected, measure his 
step and speech and check his intercourse under the -watchful 
eye of the armed guards of a foreign nation. As Alethi 
looked upon this worse than vassalage and this imprisonment 
in free air, he turned with dissatisfaction from the city’s 
faded splendors, and thought they were better buried in the 
lazy brine that laved them, than to mock with a past glory 
and a departed but not forgotten freedom its once haughty 
children. 

“ But they never had real freedom,” said Philoscommon, 
“ though affecting the name.” 

“ No, but their masters were their own lords, not foreign- 
ers. To any of these men who love their country life must 
be perpetually embittered. The dawning sun shows the 
white coats of the servants of a foreign master, and, till he 
shuts himself up in his chamber, the night does not conceal 


OF ALETHITHERAS, 


111 


tliem. It seems to me I would rather be the crab that creeps 
upon those walls, where the tide has left him, than one of 
these down-hearted citizens.” 

They took a second long and unsated look of the greatest 
work of the great colorist whose fame is more eternal than 
the city whose walls he adorned, without sometimes as 
well as in a hundred sites within ; they glanced hastily over 
the varieties of the treasure-house, where, among other things 
of scarcely more utility though less unreal, they were shown 
specimens of the true milk of the Jesousian Virgin-Mother, 
her hair and her vail, of the blood of her celestial Son and 
the wood and nails of his tree of suffering, and hastened from 
the noiseless streets and water-ways of the widow of the 
Radian Sea. 

They visited next well-peopled Niw£, capital of the Pto- 
chalazons, those misproud masters of the sea crowned city 
and its territory ; a people gay and pleasant enough ; but with 
whom amusement is not always innocence and enjoyment does 
not imply rational liberty ; for, with more numerous public 
libraries than are found perhaps anywhere else, the press is 
bridled with a bit of iron, the Leipod / ermi have fewer rights 
of men than now are allowed them by the Keblah-Alum, and 
the Emperor himself, among the haughtiest of earthly poten- 
tates, binds himself by written contract to the priest-elected 
theocrat of Ariospolis. 

Leaving Niw6 without regret, they journeyed east to Mon- 
achopolis, head city of the modem kingdom of ISTeryba. Here 
it pleased Alethi and rejoiced his scholarly companion to see 
the well-stored walls of the stately palace reared to letters 
and set wide-open to the world. After they had viewed its 
ancient treasures, and explored awhile with infinite delight 
its endless catalogues, each wrote upon a slip of paper fur- 
nished him the name of some book he wanted, Philoscommon 
to the extent of several folio volumes, and subscribed his 
name, then sat down to a commodious table w T here other 


112 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


students were already seated, and read uninterrupted till the 
hour the place was closed. 

“ This,” said Philoscommon, “ is, saving one, the largest 
library in the world. Its greater sister is like it free to every 
visitor, but not like it, that I know, in one respect, that this 
adds a privilege for such as give the personal pledge of some 
official personage, or, if a foreigner, of the ambassador of his 
country, of taking home with him the volumes he desires to 
read. It is one however that will be of no advantage to us, 
for, of course, there is no ambassador from Medamou.” 

It was with a feeling of deep respect that, as they passed 
to the grand staircase on their way out, Alethi. turned round 
to see again the lofty statue of the royal builder and patron, 
which, with that of the ducal founder, his progenitor, stands 
newly cut in marble outside the great entrance to the Reading- 
Room. 

“ And there he is now,” said Philoscommon, as descending 
the flight of steps from the portal, where sit above the para- 
pet the giant images of four great men of old, each foremost 
of his kind in ancient days, and representing Poetry, Philoso- 
phy, Medicine and History. “ That is King Dwigul of Nery- 
ba, or the Old King, as they call him now, since he has re- 
signed in favor of his son.” 

It was a respectable, but by no means distinguished-look- 
ing person whom they saw approach; and this want of 
marked gentility of mien was increased by a brown suit of 
clothes and a sky-blue silk cravat, which was tied with a 
broad double bow, the two ends, broad likewise and stiff, 
projecting horizontally on either side of his neck. His gait 
was hasty, careless. But as he passed the travelers and saw 
them stand and raise their hats, he lifted his own completely 
from his head, and swept it toward the ground in the fashion 
of his country. In so doing he projected his bent arm so 
directly from his body that the action had an unusual air of 
awkwardness ; but there played about his lips and lighted up 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


113 


all his visage a smile of acknowledgment that was exceedingly 
attractive and almost fascinating. The features of the King 
were strongly marked, with a character of passion, his light 
eyes denoting rapidity of thought and intelligence and high 
education, his mouth voluptuousness if not sensuality, which 
was read also in the indentations and muscular furrows of 
his face, and was heightened by the lightness of his com- 
plexion, which seemed to indicate a beard that, if worn, 
would have been sandy or very light of color. On one side 
of his forehead was a large wen, resembling in proportion as 
in size the longitudinal section of an egg. 

Remarking on this deformity, Alethi expressed surprise 
that the King by his over-courtesy should reveal it. “ It is 
both of the man and of the people — and indeed of the King,” 
said Philoscommon. “ In the land of turbans, they are said 
to have an imprecatory proverb, ‘ May your grandfather’s head 
be uncovered in Hell like a Micromereian’s.’ Dwigul himself 
is one of the best of fellows ( I cannot express his personal 
character better than in that familiar way, ) and as a king is 
too immeasurably above his people to feel that there is dan- 
ger in approaching them too nearly, as with constitutional 
monarchs in freer countries.” 

The travelers as they talked had crossed to the other side 
of the spacious street, so as to keep the King in view, and 
Alethi now beheld, to his surprise and delight, the little 
children, as the King passed them, put out their tiny hands, 
which he took in his, lightly and without stopping, but with 
an expression so full of goodness, so full of that best of feel- 
ings which is most Christ-like, that Alethi felt already that 
he loved him. But all was not yet seen. Presently a com- 
mon boy, at least fourteen years of age, came up to the King 
without removing his cap, still more without taking from his 
mouth the segar he was smoking, and asked him something. 
The King made a full stop, answered the boy, pointing as he 
spoke with his right arm in the direction of the fountains. 


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and finally taking hold of the boy by the arm led him a few 
steps, and pointed down a street to the right which led to 
the great Garden. 

“ There,” said Philoscommon, “ ycfu have this singular 
man, King, Micromereian, just as he is. He is a creature of 
impulses ; a poet, a scholar, the friend and patron of artists, 
if not an artist himself, of a race that were princes in the 
land a thousand years ago, he has no pride in his birth or 
rank as such, though perfectly conscious of it. Yet is he 
so vain, I might say vainglorious, you will everywhere, on 
almost all the monuments — for almost all are of his crea- 
tion, find his name as the erector, everywhere his picture. — 
But let us turn back, not to seem to follow him.” They left 
the King pursuing his way toward the Gate of Victory, and 
took their own over the asphalt pavement in the direction 
of the Palace. “ Such a character in its moral attributes,” 
continued the schoolmaster, “ few people are able to under- 
stand. They would measure his actions by certain rules, 
though he himself has never regarded them. A few years 
since he became enamoured of a fascinating foreign dancer, 
gave her a pretty house, embowered, and secluded behind a 
wall, a carriage, and to crown his folly created her a Count- 
ess. His subjects — he then was regnant — hissed him in 
the streets, and pelted the carriage with stones.” 

“Rightly.” 

“ Ah ! ‘ Pluck the beam out of thine own eye.’ Dost 
thou forget Minnchen ? ” 

“ No ; but she is the mote and not the beam. Am I mar- 
ried ? Have I a people to set an example to ? Was my 
fancy, besides, a sensual amour ? ” 

“ Cleverly put, Alethi. But you misapprehend me. You 
are not guilty of a crime, which Dwigul -was. But you 
obeyed in your case precisely the impulse which the King 
allowed to drag him on in his. I meant merely to show you 
his character, which is precipitate, impulsive, passionate, but 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


115 


full of generous and manly feeling, susceptible of every good 
and honest and noble impulse, and fearless in giving way to 
the dictates of a wide-reaching humanity, unchecked by 
sense of station and unsuspicious of ridicule. When that 
rude boy, ignorant ( he must have been an entire stranger 
here ) of whom he addressed, kept the segar in his mouth, 
while he asked the way of that plain-looking solitary gentle- 
man, there is not perhaps another in his royal station that 
would not have turned from him disgusted. A Philautian 
noble, ten to one, would have brushed haughtily by, and told 
the boy to ask some of the people.” 

“ Such a king might reconcile one with monarchy, and 
make one deem it was the best of rules.” 

“Ah, not so fast. Look around you. You see this noble 
street, and these great buildings. All are of his creation. 
The very quadriga on the triumphal arch was paid for out of 
his privy-purse. When you view the picture-gallery, called, 
after his scholastic predilections and perhaps from a little 
pedantry, by a naturalized Hellenic term, and the sculpture- 
gallery, designated with a like not inelegant affectation, 
when you mark the many new churches everywhere adorned 
with paintings by his order, and the outside walls of a new 
gallery similarly decorated ( though you will not admire in 
an ethical view the taste of the adornment, which is how- 
ever more the painter’s fault than his, ) you will think him 
admirable. But go into the streets of the old town. See 
the petty shops. Learn how tied down by prescription is 
every mode of business-life, — every tradesman limited to 
certain articles, and every artificer to certain fabrics, — a 
price put daily by the magistracy upon meats as well as 
bread, — and mark how very poor are all this people, you 
will think there is something else for a king to do than to 
make beautiful the capital of his ancestors and to glorify his 
own name among monarchs.” 

Alethi was very silent. His companion looked at him a 


116 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


moment, then said : “ Here we are already at the Old Resi- 
dence, as they call the ancient part of the Palace. Let us 
enter this arch. You see that irregular mass of stone with 
the iron band about it. Do you believe any man could lift it ? ” 
“ No ! ” 

“Well, one of the King’s ducal ancestors did, and hurled 
it too. Yet, as you see by the same old verses on the tablet 
which tells this, it weighs three-hundred and sixty-four 
pounds.” 

“ What stuff!” 

“ Read on. The topmost of those three nails in the wall is 
twelve feet from the ground, and the same doughty personage 
leaped up and struck it down with his foot.” 

“ These are fables for children.” 

“ Surely not. When we ascend, in this same Palace, to the 
Rich Chapel, as it is called, w r here royal superstition and de- 
votion have collected w r ith misapplied extravagance all sorts 
of relics into a cabinet of costly, puerile, and often from their 
nature repulsive vanities, you will find the right hand of 
Joannes Baptizator, the precursor of these Jesousians’ man- 
god. I think after that you may believe the leap and the lift.” 

It was now the first month of summer. So one day they 
rambled with satisfaction in the great and fair Garden, which 
is called Philautian, from the- imitation of a Philautian 
park. Here too, they found monuments of the king’s taste 
and at the same time of his vanity. As they returned, they 
heard toward the Palace end the sound of music. It was 
the opening of the season for the weekly public concerts in 
the Garden. A crowd was gathered. And there, in the 
midst of the crowd, sat in one open carriage the young Queen 
with her children standing up before her, while on the out- 
side of the circle, in another vehicle with a single seat was 
perched King Dwigul with his wife, he himself holding the 
whip and reins. The old King soon drove off, and the trav- 
elers gave their undivided attention to the Queen, who was 


OF ALETHI THERAS. 


117 


a charming person ; charming, not from her beauty, although 
she was rather pretty, but from her modesty. Though the 
daughter of a king, and the mother of children the eldest 
of whom, a boy, could not be less than twelve years of age, 
she seemed as abashed as a school-maiden who for the first 
time receives a prize in public, — blushing and casting down 
her eyes, while the people stood close at the wheels of the 
carriage, with no guards to keep them back and the liveried 
servants taking no notice of them. 

“ Is this always so ? ” asked Alethi. 

“ I believe not,” answered Philosc. “ The royal family 
probably attend the opening concert, but not the others.” 

“ But what a charming princess ! ” 

“ Truly.” 

“ And such freedom of the people ! ” 

“Ah, my dear Alethi, it is precisely because the people 
are not free that they enjoy this facility of access. It is so 
in all despotic countries. In Philautia, where there is real 
freedom for the populace the Queen does not suffer its near 
approach, and probably dares not. You will never see in 
Chriunopolis the common people bare the head to their sov- 
ereign with the same reverence, mingled with a kind of filial 
affection, which you may observe at all times here.” 

“ And is that difference in loyal regard owing solely to the 
difference in political freedom ? ” 

“It is a puzzling question. In countries where slavery 
exists the master allows himself a greater familiarity with his 
slave ( and the slave assumes it on occasion towards his mas- 
ter ) than would be sufferable in the case of ordinary servants, 
with whom the license would subvert all discipline. But in 
governments this approach to patriarchal habits does not 
prevent revolution ; and one particular is to be observed as 
common to all kinds of monarchy, — wherever you go you 
will find the barracks of the soldiery in convenient nearness 
to the dwelling of the sovereign.” 


118 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER X Y 1 1 . 

They see an extraordinary picture, and witness a decapitation 
ly the sword. 

The travelers remained long in Monachopolis, Philoscom- 
mon, as Alethi meant he should, going every day to the great 
Library, where he immersed himself in the deepest study, 
and to his companion’s surprise in a subject of Jesousian 
church-history, wherein he toiled hour after hour unwearied 
in research and busy as a bee, never trusting to the assertion 
of any author, but going himself in all cases to the very 
fountain-head, and with a delight that beamed from every 
feature and seemed to tremble in his very fingers, making his 
neighbors forget his strange figure in positive admiration. 

In one of the intervals of rest which a religious festival 
compelling the closure of the Readingroom afforded him, he 
accompanied Alethitheras to see a great picture which had 
just arrived from the North, from that country whose pain- 
ters were in olden time famous for their coloring. It was a 
masterpiece in every respect ; rich in coloring, vigorous yet 
chaste in tone — as became the subject, powerful in effect 
both ethic and aesthetic, able in design and drawing, and 
good in composition. It represented the dead bodies of two 
nobles, the highest in birth and popular estimation in their 
country, which was the country of the painter. These men 
had been beheaded by the merciless order of the minister of 
a merciless and bigoted tyrant who was the foreign master 


OF ALETHITHERAS, 


119 


of the country at that time, and who dreaded the influence 
of these men, especially the foremost, with their subjected 
countrymen. 

They are on a bier covered to the chin with a black velvet 
pall, on which lies a massive silver crucifix. The heads are 
so disposed, that while they join each its respective body you 
see they are not united thereto. The livid aspect, the closed 
eyes, the beard matted with blood, as also partly the hair, 
tell the rest ; and the story has its confirmation in the hand 
of the nearest body, which, beautifully executed, hangs life 
less yet perfect outside from under the pall. In the fore- 
ground, at the foot of the bier, are the burgomaster and other 
citizens of the place of the tyranny, who, with heads un- 
covered and with countenances and attitudes full of sorrow 
and reverence and awe, are approaching to pay their last 
respects to the dead. On the other side of the bier stand 
certain satellites of the tyrant, one of whom, leaning on his 
long cross-hilted sword, bends his eyes with a gloomy 
scowl on the chief person of the group. You read instantly 
his feelings, and his purpose; his hatred — national jealousy 
perhaps, his suspicion, and his determination to report to his 
superiors the least sign of resentment that the burgomaster 
may betray. In an angle of the remote background a priest, 
with his back turned, is seen lighting one candle by another 
upon an altar, thus indicating the scene. 

It was impossible to speak before such a picture. Not till 
they were in the open air did Alethi say : 

What does that picture want to excite the admiration of 
the universe, but time ? ” 

“ That time which will mar its splendor, and add nothing 
to the justness of its tone.” 

“ How contemptible,” continued Alethi, with the effect of 
the spectacle still evident in his voice, “ how contemptible 
does such a theme, so executed, make the thousand and one 
Madonnas with the Infant, apocryphal Saints, and incon- 


120 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


ceivable Cherubs, which have wasted the best energies of the 
best painters of the best century of art ! ” 

“ Contemptible both in effect and in the lesson they 
convey.” 

“ Yes, this is History arrayed by Poetry, with not a fold of 
her drapery amplified into heaviness or multiplied into little- 
ness, and with nothing overcharged in ornament. And for 
the lesson! is it not a wonder, Philos', that they would 
admit this picture here ? ” 

“ It would be, but this is a great School of Art, and its 
chief creator as most munificent patron has always made 
politics a secondary thing ; not to say that the one of the 
two dead Counts who is the chief was married to a princess 
of this country. But the lesson is unmistakable; and the 
effect must be endurable.” 

“ With those who feel as I do. It is a picture never to be 
forgotten.” 

“ No more than the accursed deed which furnished its sub- 
ject. A great Micromereian poet has made the scene the 
occasion of a badly constructed drama. It has good repute ; 
but I would rather be the painter of that one canvas than 
the author of all his jumble, which has belittled his hero 
and not aggrandized his theme.” 

The winter was come. One day Philoscommon asked his 
friend if he would not like to see an execution. Alethi 
showed reluctance. 

“ Come,” said Philosc, “ it is the only chance you will 
probably ever have of seeing one done by a sword. And to 
blunt your sensibility, I will tell you it is to be on a youth 
who poisoned his own mother.” 

“ Through what motive ? ” 

“ To obtain her money sooner than it would come to him 
in the course of nature. As she was a peasant, it could have 
been at most but a pitiful sum ; yet the wretch mixed the 
arsenic with her food time after time, till at last becom- 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


121 


ing impatient at the lingering kind of sickness he had craft- 
ily produced, and feeling no compunction at her agonies, he 
increased the dose, consummated his work at once, and was 
discovered. We will first- go to the town-house, where a 
ceremony takes place that is curious.” 

They found the streets leading to the square where stood 
this edifice guarded by cavalry. A considerable guard was 
also drawn up opposite the building, and forming three sides 
of a hollow square. The morning was intensely cold. Ale- 
thi’s breath made little icicles in his beard, and Philoscom- 
mon’s singular features were swelled and discolored to a de- 
gree that increased their comicalness and made them little 
in harmony with the occasion. The crowd, which kept in- 
creasing, wiled away the interval of expectation by comment- 
ing with audible mirth upon his appearance. Presently the 
rattle of wheels and of iron hoofs was heard on the pave- 
ment, and into the square of soldiery drove an open wagon 
with low sides and painted a dull lead-color. In this sat 
between two priests, and with the jailer behind him, the 
criminal, bareheaded and dressed outwardly in a long sack 
of black cotton cloth. He was barely twenty-one years old, 
with stiff black-brown hair, cut short in the neck, but left 
somewhat long on the crown. His face, not particularly ill- 
featured, but swarthy in complexion, was expressive of noth- 
ing but extreme abjectness. But it was not the abjectness 
of fear. 

The wagon stopped close to the wall of the edifice, directly 
under a window from which hung a square strip of red cloth, 
about a yard in length and covering the sill. A man with a 
cocked hat appeared, and read the particulars of the crime 
and the sentence. He then took a short staff which was handed 
him, broke it in two ; the fragments fell into the wagon ; the 
window was instantly closed ; the crowd taking the signal 
rushed from the square ; and preceded, surrounded, followed 
by the cavalry, the wagon drove to the place of execution. 

6 


122 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


But fast as the crowd ran, the wagon went faster, and soon 
had passed our travelers, who were walking, though hurriedly ; 
and they noticed that on the back of the convict, who sat 
constantly with his head down and with the same abject, 
criminal look, was a board with the word, in Micromereian, 
Murder. After the wagon, followed an open carriage with 
certain fine-looking officers whose duty required their atten- 
dance, in the full uniform of their functions. 

As that portion of the crowd which had been behind them 
passed our travelers on a run, Alethi noticed their great good- 
humor. At first, turning round as they ran, they bantered 
Philoscommon for his blue nose, which they called a veal- 
sausage, telling him it was badly cooked ; but a chimney- 
sweeper coming along with his ladder and brush, they turned 
their jocularity upon him. One of them jostled him. Rapid 
as thought the man shook his sooty brush over him, angrily, 
with certain exclamations. The crowd was delighted, even 
he who was sprinkled taking his correction in good part, and 
the laughter was loud. All this when the wagon with its 
miserable load was directly abreast of them. 

Alethi for the moment felt as if he would like to turn back, 
for very shame of being mixed with such a herd. But the 
schoolmaster, pressing his arm, said : “ It is always so. What 
would you ? These people come out to see a show, and have 
no thought of the misery of him who furnishes it.” 

“ But they might be decent.” 

“ That would be demanding of them to be unexcited. In 
the height of their spirits they forget, as the best of us will 
do, that their mirth is out of place. It is involuntary and 
purely animal, nothing of the mind.” 

“ But why are you and I not of them ? ” 

“ Not pleasurably excited ? O Alethi ! Do you not think, 
that of all this crowd there is not perhaps one man so bred 
as you or so educated as I ? But for your pride, you would 
now run ; for the chance is we may be too late : you see the 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


123 


wagon is driven, humanely, at the rapidest trot, and the 
guards are galloping. What have these people to do with 
pride ? Besides, their motive is different from ours. ( Let 
us hasten. ) They probably have seen the act more than 
once, some of them at least : two men were beheaded, on the 
same spot, not two months ago. ( Quicker ! nobody sees us 
now.) It is to these but an exciting scene. You go to 
gratify a reasonable curiosity, to obtain a certain knowledge ; 
but your sensations are the reverse of cheerful. Therefore 
you have no excitement ( come, you must hurry ! ) to make 
you forget decency.” 

When the travelers reached the scaffold, which was an 
open platform, surrounded with a red stuff curtain about two 
feet high, and having a simple arm-chair with a low back, 
like an office chair, in the midst, the criminal and his attend- 
ants were no longer visible, -while the horsemen were drawn 
close up to the scaffold, and the crowd, of whom a large pro- 
portion were women, in their rear. Standing among them, 
close to the tails of the horses, Alethi and his friend were 
well posted. 

They had but just time to notice the decent appearance 
and good behavior of the whole assemblage, when on the 
scaffold came the actors in the brief tragedy. First w T as a 
man of extraordinary stature, whose height, certainly full six 
feet and a half, was made still more remarkable by his lofty 
bearing, and the manner in -which his hair, which was red, 
was combed upward from his forehead. He was dressed, 
like the criminal, in a black cotton sack or gown girt about 
the waist, which showed his straight and powerful figure 
to no disadvantage. His countenance was serious without 
morosencss, and even dignified. You would hardly have 
thought him the executioner but for an enormous two- 
handed sword which he held aloft. After him came the 
criminal. After him, the executioner’s assistant, likewise 
bareheaded. 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


The criminal was secured in the chair. The assistant 
grasped with one hand, extended to the full length of the 
arm, the hair of his crown ; the executioner at his post raised 
in both hands the huge weapon. At that moment Alethi, 
who had his eyes on the face of the criminal, which as yet 
had betrayed not the least emotion of any kind, saw a slight, 
an almost imperceptible flinching, as if he heard the sword 
in the air, and the next instant the broad blade went sheer 
through the neck. 

There was an audible though low exclamation from the 
women, a drawing of the breath as if in pain. The execu- 
tioner had disappeared. His assistant carried round the 
slightly dripping head, which became almost instantly of 
that livid color which Alethi had seen in paintings of Go- 
liath’s head and the like, and had discredited as unnatural, 
while from the motionless body spirted up, like fountains, 
three streams of blood, the central one much larger than 
the others, and which looked black in the frosty air. 

Alethi, who had not observed that the criminal was fas- 
tened, so quickly it had been done, now saw the assistant 
unstrap the legs and arms from the chair ; another man ap- 
peared ; the body was carried down, laid in a coffin with the 
head beside it, a pall with a cross of white cloth sewed on 
the centre was thrown over it, and it was borne away, all 
with the greatest celerity. Then one of the priests, wearing 
his sacerdotal cap and holding a book in his hand, ascended 
the scaffold, and began to harangue the crowd, commencing 
with “ This is human blood,” and proceeding to show by 
what course of crime the heart which once held it had been 
made to forfeit it to the law. After listening to a few com- 
monplace words, pronounced in the genuine sacerdotal nasal 
tone, Philoscommon said “ This is not for us,” and the trav- 
elers turned away. 

When they had walked for some time in silence, “ Well ? ” 
said the schoolmaster interrogatively. 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


125 


“I am surprised,” replied Alethi, “that I am not more 
shocked. I did not feel the least horror.” 

“You will to-morrow, enough of it, and perhaps to-night. 
It may last you for a week, and undiminished.” 

“ What makes you think so ? ” 

“ Because you will then have the bloody scene before your 
imagination, without any of the circumstances which miti- 
gated the aspect of the reality.” 

“ And those were ? ” 

“ In the first place, your detestation of the crime, which 
deadened all feeling for the criminal ; then, the presence of 
the crowd and the novelty of the scene with its actors ; and 
finally, you had wrought yourself up to the expectation of 
something more horrible, and the celerity of the act, and its 
cleanness so to say, and the evident absence of all pain — at 
least for more than a moment, acted like a disappointment, 
and kept your nerves from fresh tension.” 

“ Yes, I was not prepared for such dispatch. It was won- 
derful. Not a motion, not a quiver ; as quickly as you could 
clap your hands together ; and the death as instantaneous as 
that of the mosquito you crush suddenly between your palms.” 

“ Then do you think this mode of execution preferable to 
hanging, or decapitation by the drop-axe ? ” 

“ To hanging, if the object is to save from suffering. I 
have never seen the drop-axe. But I confess to you, Philos', 
that this dissolution seems to me to have been too easy for 
that wretch, who saw unmoved his mother die by inches and 
in agonies.” 

“ Certainly, there is hardly exact justice in it as a retribu- 
tion, and as a punishment of crime with the view to deter 
others, which after all should be the sole object with the law, 
I doubt whether it be wise any more than just to make one 
inode of punitive death apply to every mode of murder.” 

“ Would you then prescribe exact retaliation ? ” 

“I am not sure. The subject of crimes and punishments 


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is one requiring profound study. I have thought seriously, 
Alethi, of some time devoting myself to it, with a view to a 
treatise thereon. All my opinions as yet are undecided.” 

“ But as you have formed them ? ” 

“Well, I am not prepared to say that I would, were it in 
my power, make the mode of punishment in capital cases to 
correspond, so far as it could be done, precisely to that of 
the crime ; but it seems to me at present that it ought to be 
so, not merely in justice but in policy. Where is the sense 
of executing in the same manner the fiendish wretch who 
commits a deliberate murder with circumstances of peculiar 
atrocity, and the unhappy victim of his passions who strikes 
down the object of his hatred with a single blow ? Him 
who poisons by repeated doses I would destroy in like man- 
ner, as the wretched youth we have seen beheaded.” 

“ And do you think that this discrimination would tend 
to make such monsters less inhuman ? ” 

“ There, Alethi, is my doubt. In Philautia, they used to 
hang a man for forgery, for highway robbery, and in some 
cases for petty theft. Yet such crimes were quite as common 
there then as they are now. In the oldest empire of Tapros- 
heo, they will cut a man to pieces for rebellion. In one 
recent instance, they actually flayed the chief criminal and 
dissected his wife, commencing with her breasts, while up- 
wards of a hundred of his followers were one after another 
beheaded, yet rebellion may be said to be there perennial if 
not perpetual. In a certain barbarous nation I have read of, 
the punishment of adultery is burial of both the culprits 
alive in one grave, yet I need not say the sin thrives there as 
everywhere else. In Tisnu lately, a Sheikh, who was a 
Hadjce and sixty-seven years old, was ordered by the Bey to 
receive two thousand blows with a stick. He was laid on 
his face, his feet tied together, and his head and shoulders 
kept motionless by a soldier. A good-sized cudgel was used, 
and the strokes were given upon the small of the back, dif- 


OF ALETHITHEE AS, 


127 


ferent men succeeding as executioners, till the whole two thou- 
sand blows were given. The old man was taken up dead.” 

“ Are men such devils ? ” 

“ Devils, my dear Alethi ? If ingenuity in cruelty and 
mercilessness in its infliction were the qualifications for rule 
in Hell, its government might be left to humanity. Seven 
more chiefs, some older than the Hadjee, were put to death 
in the same manner. And the punishment but not prevention 
is repeated, we are told, almost daily.” 

“ Then it is not the severity of a punishment that will 
make it effective ? ” 

“ To deter from repetition ? No. The certainty of its in- 
fliction will more avail. But even that is ineffectual. Hence 
it was perhaps, as much as from his benevolence, that our 
good King Dwigul abolished capital punishment, which has 
been restored under his successor.” 

“ That showed its necessity.” 

“ Not at all, any more than its efficacy. Did I not tell you 
that two men were beheaded here at one time but a few 
weeks ago ? The only remedy for crime is education, and 
how precarious that is I need not say, with the thousand 
examples before us, from history and in our time, of the best- 
instructed and the foremost in position failing. Thus you 
see I am all in the dark even yet. But one thing is before 
me in the brightness of noonday.” 

“ And what is that ? ” 

“ That whether it deter from capital crime or not, the pun- 
ishment of death is necessary as a means to get rid of nox- 
ious animals. There are creatures which we dare not leave 
at large ; there are others which w T e crush at once. And 
many human beings are of this kind, both men and women. 
Would you kill a cobra, yet leave alive one moment the de- 
liberate assassin of his mother ? ” 

“ And what was the crime or crimes of those two you 
mentioned ? ” 


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“ I know not. — But here we are in Dwigul’s own street; 
and there is that magnificent Library, — blessings on its 
founder ! ” 

“ I fear, Philos', these people are very bad.” 

“ The Monachopolitans ? Have you then found them so ? ” 
And the schoolmaster smiled — after his odd fashion. 

“ Not particularly savage. I rather like them. But they 
are great rogues.” 

“What, more than the Anastesians ? ” said the school- 
master laughing. 

“ I did not suffer as often at their hands.” 

“ No, you did not stay long enough in any one place to 
give them a chance, as here. Wait, my dear susceptibility, 
till you have passed through several more kingdoms. I will 
then ask you where you found the rogues most numerous, 
and you will be at a loss to tell me.” 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

They go to the "kingdom of Chassen and visit Blinre , where 
Philoscommon gives an ethic lesson in art-matters. 

Sursia is passed by, but not forgotten. 

When Spring had cleared away the snows, the travelers 
journeyed north, to the Kingdom of Chassen. They spent 
a day or two in Isapli, famous for its fairs, and the great 
book-mart for all Micromereia. Thence deflecting south 
again, they visited the renowned porcelain-factory at Sem- 
seni, and rambled till near sunset in its romantic environs, 
then, abandoning the land road for the pleasant river which 
flows beside the town, pursued their way to Nedders the 
handsome capital. 

The travelers looked with amused surprise, not unmingled 


OF ALETHITHERAS, 


129 


"with contempt, at the monstrous iron crown which surmounts 
the gateway of one of the Palaces. There, as they admired 
the sitting statue of one of the princes, Philoscommon said, 
pointing to the pile of buildings in ruins, “ You see, Alethi, 
that emblem which was made as big as possible, as if to 
make the most of a crown that — as royal — is only of 
yesterday, has not made much impression : the people de- 
stroyed the substantial edifice, but left the empty bauble up- 
right that formed its sign. When we visit the famous pic- 
ture-gallery, which invites and retains visiters to this city 
who would not go out of their way to inspect all the costly 
knickknacks assembled in the curiosity-shop of the King’s 
residence, you will s§e other deplorable evidence of the blind 
fury of a populace, or of their destructiveness, half-wanton, 
half-malicious, when they have a temporary power over what 
they envy and have been accustomed to respect as above 
them. Its walls are perforated with bullets, and some of the 
precious paintings have not escaped.” 

“ Is a mob more moderate in republics ? ” 

“ Usually. They consider such things as belonging to 
them, and spare their own property. You remember how 
indignant you felt to see the green sward stamped into bar- 
renness in the Garden at Monacliopolis, although a large 
ticket set-up in various places commends it and its property 
to the public protection. You and I with our thin soles were 
walking over the gravel, at the same time that groups of 
workingmen chose for their heavy clouted shoes the springy 
turf that was so fresh beside us. In the great Park of 
the chief city of Isopoliteia, I never saw that done. In 
Chaunopolis, a royal Garden which adjoins the principal 
Park has been made free to the people. In return, the pub- 
lic trampled out a new walk for themselves through the 
grove. So the wardens were obliged to follow their traces 
and finish the footpath with the spade. In the same city a 
few years since, their greatest hero had every pane of glass 
6 * 


130 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


smashed in the windows of the stately house that was given 
him for his services.” 

“ It is the lawlessness arising from over-restraint.” 

“ Probably, though there is not much of that in Pliilautia. 
It is owing also to their ignorance. In Isopoliteia, it is 
noticeable that riots of every sort are almost always the out- 
break of foreigners.” 

“ I shall be impatient till we get there,” said Alethi. 

The schoolmaster’s proboscis seemed to shorten itself in 
w’rinkles. “ Be moderate,” he replied : “ to expect too much 
is to solicit disappointment, everywhere but in Medamou.” 

Again they traveled north, and went to Blinr&, capital of 
Pseusern. Here Philoscommon made his friend stand be- 
tween the magnificent equestrian statue and the vast Palace, 
and facing the Museum look up and down, then facing the 
Palace turn to his right hand and his left. 

“ Well ?” he asked. 

Alethi turned to him his visage beaming with satisfaction. 
“ This,” he exclaimed, “ is truly worthy of a great capital. 
I should suppose the like of this place is not to be seen else- 
where in the whole w T orld.” 

“ Taking it altogether, — the general view, the buildings, 
and the objects of art, noble in themselves and placed just 
where they should be, — I hardly think there is. We shall 
have to spend some weeks in BlinrA When we visit the 
neighboring town and the country-palace famous as the resi- 
dence of the great king whose brazen figure is beside you, 
you will then see a row of marble nudities of both sexes that 
w r ill make you blush, unless you choose rather to laugh at a 
demoralizing ugliness which is permitted to deform the ap- 
proach to u r hat is otherwise pleasing to the eye and good for 
the soul. What we now admire is worthy of the best days of 
the great city of ancient art ; then , if you think at all of such, 
you will only remember that her sculptors made their women 
virgins and their meh innocent.” 


OP ALETHITHEEAS. 


131 


Aletlii asked liim for an explanation, which Philoscommon 
gave. “ But,” said the former, “ unless the people were 
gross, w T ould such ridiculous indecencies be tolerated ? You 
remember what w r e saw when going up that goodly river in 
Chassen.” 

“ You mean the men who leaped and dived in the water 
and turned summersets above it without a rag upon them, 
while the ladies in the boat looked on unflinching, but not 
without a blush. Psha ! that is Pantachousian, not Micro- 
mereian. In Chaunopolis, they permit bathing in the arti- 
ficial river of one of their Parks, provided it be done at a 
certain hour in the morning and in the evening. One morn- 
ing in early summer, I saw on the bank of the stream a young 
man stark naked, drying himself with a long towel, which 
he held by the ends and passed first over one shoulder, then 
over the other, with more advantage to his muscles than to 
the modesty of the girls who at that hour were going to their 
work, and two of whom were actually crossing the bridge 
directly in his face at the time.” 

“Perhaps they think the modesty of working-girls not 
worth minding in Chaunopolis.” 

“ It is not improbable. At all events, you will find men 
in general decent, and women for the most part chaste, only 
in Medamou.” 

“ But, in that ancient city you alluded to ? ” 

“ I made no reference to its morals, but only to its taste in 
art. At the time the latter flourished, the former were what 
you may suppose from the witticisms of its best comic poet. 
In the great Museum at Chaunopolis there is a vase, among 
others made in a colony of that people, on which you will see 
a satirical picture of Zeus’s amour with Alcmen£. Hermes, 
who is holding a ladder for the god to the window of the 
lady’s chamber, is provided ethograpliically with an append- 
age that is only a caricature of the deformity that will disgust 
if not amuse you there.” 


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The travelers’ stay in Blinr& was long and satisfactory. 
Then Philoscommon said : “ Shall we visit the provinces 
that lie above us and at our right hand, or better, going 
north to Oderufer take there passage on the East Sea for 
the great Sursian capital, built in despite of nature by the 
perseverance and the despotism of the iron-nerved man 
whose name it bears ? The season is yet pleasant. Sursia is 
one of the two Colossi of the Earth.” 

“ And the other ? ” 

“ Is Isopoliteia. They will one day divide the power of 
the world between them. They stand as two giants, whose 
growth, already prodigious, is not yet finished. And the 
little nations that are between them hate and fear them 
equally, anticipating with terror the day when their mighty 
hands shall touch across the ocean. Hence, and because of 
their similarity in youth and wonderful increase, though 
there is nothing congenerous in their forms of government, 
and because their respective spheres can never come into col- 
lision, until that distant era when, having attained their 
utmost growth, the Titans may become rivals, they are nat- 
ural allies, and as Sursia is the staunchest friend of Isopol- 
iteia, so the latter is the only country which does justice to 
Sursia.” 

“ Perhaps it is the only one that can appreciate her.” 

“ Perhaps so. But there is more than that. Isopoliteia, 
from its form of government has immeasurably the advan- 
tage of Sursia, therefore cannot envy it, as the latter, mov- 
ing, though more slowly, towards the same goal, sees every- 
thing to admire in the towering giant whose arms, stretched 
out to meet its own, evince already the unconquerable force 
itself shall have one day, while both behold themselves en- 
vied, hated, maligned and vilified more or less by all the 
Powers that lie between them, and most by those that are 
least dwarfed and shadowed by their enormous magnitude. 
Shall we go thither ? ” 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


133 


“ Not unless you wish it, Philos 7 . It is too far. Of what 
character are the people ? ” 

“ I have never been there,” said the philosopher smiling. 
“ And if I had, you know how travelers draw conclusions. 
They take the individuals that cross their path and make 
them sit for portraits of the nation.” 

“ Well, what do they say of the Sursians?” 

“ The Philautians, who do not love them, for the reason I 
have given, call them boors and gluttons, and the Isopoli- 
teians, who favor and are favored, find their nobles courteous 
and affable, and their common people kindly and fair to deal 
with. How have you found the Pseusem ? ” 

“ Humph ! pleasant, but rather tricky.” 

“More so than the Chassen and the Neryban and the 
Anastesians ? ” 

“ Why no. Confound it ! I never know where I am worst 
treated.” 

“ When it comes to a bargain. You will find out perhaps 
in Medamou. As a nail sticketh fast 'between the joinings of 
the stones , so, in buying and selling — all are Pantachousians.” 


CHAPTER XIX. 

They descend to the middle region of lakes and mountains , 
where the younger traveler is enlightened unpleasantly . 

Stjrsia was not visited, nor yet the intervening provinces 
of Pseusern. Instead of journeying east and to the north, 
they went both to the west and to the south. City after 
city they visited, and capital after capital, finding in most 
of the latter some prominent object worth remarking, but 
nowhere meeting with adventure, and nowhere gathering 
anything worth recording in manners or in morals. Panta- 


134 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


chousia was in every people, and lent sameness more often 
than piquancy to intercourse with all; and Philoscommon 
smiled, or laughed, or made contortions, or wwiggled, as he 
saw his companion vexed to find his trustfulness repaid with 
extortion, his truthfulness and openness with dissimulation 
and falsehood, his courtesy with insolence, and his gentle- 
ness and considerateness with presumption and selfish en- 
croachment. “ In time, you will learn,” he said. “ When 
we get to Medamou again, perhaps you will tell me, Alethi, 
which among men are the worthiest.” 

But coming to the lovely river the poet calls/ bicornous , 
they ascended toward its fountains in the region of eternal 
snows, — greatly to Alethi’s relief and pleasure, nor less to 
the gratification of the schoolmaster, who reminded, by the 
epithet we have cited, of the six-foot measures he had tried 
to beat into the laggard youth of Medamou, cried in a droll 
sort of rapture to his road-mate, bidding him bridge over 
the hiatus in the Homeric way : 

“ Hie gelidi fontes, hie mollia prata, Alethi , 

Hie nemus ! Hie ipse tecum consumerer aevo.” 

“ Heaven forbid ! ” said Alethi. 

“No, I suppose you would rather grow old with something 
more pastoral — Minnchen, for example.” He had hesi- 
tated ; but Alethi, though he said nothing, did not wince ; 
and Philoscommon felt satisfied that the wound he had 
touched was well scarred. 

Disembarking, they went to see the queen of ruins, looking 
from her hilly throne on the graceful and fair-featured stream 
which does homage at her feet ; and when the younger trav- 
eler had, with a painter’s eye and poet’s heart, taken-in all 
the magic of the unrivaled scene, and they passed slowly on 
their return the yet portcullised gate where lies the shattered 
tower, Philoscommon woke his indignation by going through 
the story of the wars of which this was but a memorial, but 
whose most deplorable traces were long since overgrown and 


OF ALETHITHBRAS. 


135 


are never thought of save in connection with this picturesque 
and stately ruin, or when one pauses to analyze the worthless 
material which helps to make the glitter in the crown of him 
whom, for even such ravages as these, his people surname 
Great. 

Not yet sated with the loveliness of nature, the travelers 
passed the short remainder of the summer in the land of 
mountains and lakes, where a purer air, and the silence, the 
distant snows, the deep and transparent water, seem to give 
a new being to the inhabitant of cities who enjoys them for 
the first time and whose blood is yet young. 

“ Here man should be purer and less sordid,” said Pliilos- 
common, turning round on his elbow where he leaned on the 
ledge of an open casement which overlooked the largest of 
the lakes. His eyes were directed to Alethi, who stood with 
a somewhat dissatisfied expression on his countenance, while 
turning out the contents of his traveling-bag. 

“ Bah ! ” said Alethi, “ and the unselfish and moral crea tures, 
some of them, have robbed me of my hair-brush, my morocco 
slippers, and one of my newest shirts.” 

“ So I thought,” said Philoscommon drily. 

“You knew it then ! you saw it — as you did the glove 
affair in Chiliopolis. Philos 7 ! ” 

“ No ; you need not look so hurt. I neither saw nor knew ; 
I guessed.” 

“ How ? ” 

“ From your dismay. I had no thought of brush, or slip- 
pers, or shirt ; but I had noticed that the iron clasp of that 

miserable bag They don’t make such things so well in 

ParthenopS as they do in Chaunopolis.” 

“ Perhaps not — unluckily. Well ? ” 

“ I noticed it had been tampered with — ( see ! the rogue 
has bent it so, that you can put your hand between ) — and 
I supposed you must have lost something.” 

“ Was it the driver ? ” 


13G 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ Doubtless. W e were bis only passengers, and be bad fine 
opportunity while we were going through that old castle.” 

“I bad thought these mountaineers were too virtuous. 
But it may not have been one.” 

“Yes; there are few foreigners that come here to labor. 
Besides I know him by his tongue. Do you suppose that 
men are good and bad, simply according to their less or 
greater distance from the clouds ? In that very castle, not 
many years since, an estimable young woman ( I knew her, ) 
the daughter of the keeper, was shot dead by a discarded 
suitor, who instantly after put an end to himself. Men, 
Alethi, are more independent in these snow-capt hills, and 
have a better chance to be virtuous, but they are not there- 
fore born such, any more than the inhabitant of effeminate 
cities is necessarily destitute of manliness and integrity. In 
the only circulating library of this little town I found yester- 
day the largest as well as vilest collection of smutty books I 
ever saw together. The least objectionable was a translation 
of the old pastoral romance of Longus, with a curious illus- 
tration of the final enlightenment of the innocents. It is 
true they were all printed in Lutetia of the Alectryons, which 
is the cosmopolitan fountain of obscenity in art and letters ; 
but how came they here, and why do they abide here ? ” 

“In that respect I suppose these mountain folk are not 
peculiar, or perhaps their circulating library is so. But they 
say they are mercenary and will sell their blood.” 

“ When they want good wages. So will most men. In 
nine cases out of ten, it is a question of means whether a man 
shall be liberal and uncovetous or not. I have told you one 
story of my grandmother’s. Let me add another, which is 
equally authentic. A gentlewoman among her friends was 
always well spoken of by all who knew her ; but the com- 
mendation was usually qualified by a depreciatory pity of 
her meanness. ‘What a dear good soul she is ! She has but 
one fault, poor woman. She is so stingy ! ’ In due course 


OP ALETHITHEKAS, 


137 




of time the good lady died, and lo, she had left barely money 
enough to bury her. Then everybody wondered how,’ on so 
mere a nothing, she had managed to keep up appearances. — 
As a reckless expenditure often gets the name of generosity, 
so an enforced economy is generally stigmatized as sordid- 
ness. In fact, in this latter condition the noblest nature will 
sully itself by actions that may well seem such. The people 
who are straitened in the mountains here are as those whose 
purses have collapsed in Pantacliou. It is only in Medamou 
that moral attributes are assigned correctly.” 

They crossed the frontier into AJectoreion, where in one 
respect Alethi found himself agreeably situated. His ame- 
nity, his affability, his open and benevolent disposition, and 
his genial manners, and the mirthfulness and jocular shrewd- 
ness of his companion made them everywhere liked by the 
gay, intelligent and witty people with whom they freely 
mingled. Philoscommon indeed remonstrated with his friend 
and quasi patron that he had forgotten entirely a condition 
of their partnership in travel, and suffered him no longer to 
drop behind as valet. “You will see,” he said, “that this 
obstinacy of good nature will bring us both into difficulty. 
In Micromereia and the mountains it was of less consequence 
that I should keep down to my subordinate part ; but here 
we shall be mocked at every step.” 

“ I have not found it so as yet,” replied Alethi. 

“Not offensively perhaps, nor conspicuously, to you ; but 
I have seen it; and when you get to Lutetia, where the 
people are the most impudent in the world, while they affect 
to be the most refined, you will remember my warning.” 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


138 


CHAPTER XX. 

What they found in the capital of the Alectryons ; and how 
the little pedagogue displayed his manhood . 

Trey reached Lutetia of the Alectryons. 

“ Do you begin to see the character of the people ? ” 
asked the schoolmaster. 

“ I think I do,” replied Alethi. “ It is indicated, unless 
I mistake, in the characteristics of their capital. I see here 
nastiness and refinement, sordidness and magnificence, the 
grossest impurity and an affected regard for outward deli- 
cacy, all in close neighborhood and often cohabiting to- 
gether. And if I mistake not there are besides, discovera- 
ble through an air of very high spirit and manlike inde- 
pendence, contemptible trickery and servility, and, with an 
assumption of great integrity in trade and the most amiable 
candor, abominable roguery and dissimulation.” 

“Ah there,” said Philoscommon, who seemed to relish 
the emphasis of his friend, “ you will have to take the palm 
of excellence from them and hand it over to their rivals ot 
Chaunopolis, who will outdo them in the servility of their 
manliness and outlie them in the candor of their dissimula- 
tion. But in every other virtue you have ascribed to them, the 
Lutetians are peerless. They are in fact the modern repre- 
sentatives of that vain and mercurial people who as autoch- 
thones wore the tettix in their hair, — as valiant, as witty, 
as fickle, as wise, as immoral, as irreligious, as refined and as 


OF A1ETEITHEKAS. 


139 


dirty as they. They will detect your foibles in a minute, 
banter you, flatter you, oblige you, push you into the kennel, 
and if you resent their insolence, or remonstrate civilly, 
take off their hat to you or fight you, just as you elect. If 
you can put me through them, head, legs and all, without a 
rubbing, I will allow I am no Erra Pater.” 

They were on their way through the Garden of the pal- 
ace to one of the great galleries of paintings, and as this 
was said there approached them two young men dressed in 
the prevalent fashion, one of whom had that peculiar 
sprightly, half-saucy half-intellectual air, which showed him 
to be an impertinent of too much brains to be thought a 
fool, but of too little sense to be much more than a fop ; a 
tall, handsome, petted child of fashion in fact, who stood 
quite as well in his own conceit as in the favor of a light- 
hearted and licentious but refined society. When they were 
but a few steps in front of our pair, the fop, looking di- 
rectly at the little schoolmaster, burst into a laugh and said 
something to his companion, who smiled, but not offen- 
sively. Finally, when about to pass, he looked again in the 
most insolent manner at Philoscommon, and said aloud to 
the other, “ Is it human ? ” 

Philosc instantly retorted : “ Not of your humanity, or I 
should drown myself as a monkey.” 

“ You may do it at once then as a monster,” returned the 
Lutetian. “ There is the river. Unless you prefer to exhibit 
yourself at so much a head.” 

This was unbearable. Alethi stepped before his friend so 
as to bring himself almost in contact with the insolent. “ If 

yon have ” he began ; but before he could complete 

the defiance, which the fop, to do him justice, was await- 
ing with a steady yet fiery look, Philoscommon jerked 
him back, exclaiming in a tone which Alethi had never 
heard from him before : “ Stop, this is my quarrel. — Give 
me your card,” he added to the Lutetian, who looked down 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


upon the little man at first surprised, then amused, then with 
a haughty gravity. “ Your name, at once,” repeated impe- 
riously the schoolmaster, “ or ! ” 

Here, to Alethi’s astonishment, the diminutive sage, whose 
features had become perfectly immovable, with the under 
lid of the eyes drawn upward a little and the under lip a 
great deal, actually raised his thin and disproportionably 
long arm with the large fist clenched. But at this critical 
moment the other Lutetian, who was narrowly observing 
Philoscommon, said authoritatively to the offender : “ He is 
right. You must apologize, or fight him.” 

The fop looked down again upon his strange antagonist 
and hesitated; but the latter had dropped his hand, though 
he still kept it clenched and his face was still bold and de- 
termined. So his look of pride relaxed into a pleasant smile ; 
he put out his hand frankly, saying, “ You have an ugly head, 
but a very fine heart.” 

“ And that would not do to exhibit,” said Pliilosc with 
his old manner, wiiile he took the hand thus offered ; “ for no 
one would give a copper to see it, anywhere.” 

“ But it has afforded me a lesson I shall remember, and for 
which I might have dearly paid,” said the other. As he 
spoke, he nodded in a friendly way to his transient antago- 
nist, his companion exchanged a distant salutation with 
Aletlii, and they both passed on. 

“ Had he known I w r as a schoolmaster, he might have been 
still more satisfied with his pretty saying than I dare say he 
was,” observed Philoscommon. 

“ But you, Philos', you are wonderful ! ” 

“ What ! for merely showing my teeth ? — figuratively, I 
mean,” added the disfumished mouth -with a grin. 

“ No, but for setting your lips in such a way as to show 
that you did not want them. I knew your magnanimity ; 
but I thought you were too philosophical for the duel.” 

“ And so I am ; but you see, there was no choice. It was 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


141 


you, who would nonsensically interfere ; and do you think, 
because I am little and ugly, I am to let you resent my quar- 
rels or usurp my honors ? ” 

“ That is well turned off,” said Alethi, shaking heartily 
his hand ; “ but in future I shall look on you as having no 
less valor than wisdom.” 

“ Why should they be separable ? They were not in another 
ugly fellow you wot of, to whom you have before compared 
me.” 

“ No, yourself.” 

“ As you will. But I assure you there was in the present 
case more wisdom than valor. That coxcomb would have 
fought you ; but he would as soon have thought of a duel 
with a frog as with such a monstrosity as I. So you see 
there was more bluster than boldness.” 

In the Gallery, they stopped inevitably before the great 
picture of the Deluge. After a very long pause of silent, 
melancholy admiration, Alethi, turning first to see that no 
one was behind them, remarked in a low tone to his com- 
panion, “ How admirably, but with what painful effect, is 
everything here in keeping ! The very sky fills one with the 
same sadness and awe and horror as that struggling group. 
I know not what you feel, Philos' ; but the poetry, the tra- 
gedy, of that group makes me at once devout and irreligious. 
Do you understand me ? ” 

“ Perfectly. One needs all one’s faith to aid one’s resig- 
nation: and but in natures like yours, Alethi, which have 
what might be called the poetry of devotion, and which 
carry to a sublime height, at once by their piety, their tender- 
ness of adoration, their knowledge and their consciousness of 
what is right, the religious submissiveness of the Salaman, 
such a picture would be more likely to foster infidelity alone, 
— that is, with hearts that rebel at injustice and commiserate 
misfortune. The mass look on without understanding and 
with but little sympathy. But apart from its ethic char- 


142 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 




acter, do you not see something to condemn in the paint- 
ing ? ” 

“ In its execution as a work of art ? ” 

“No, not absolutely; rather in the point of judgment and 
good taste in one minor detail, or that should have been 
minor, only that, consistently with the very error I speak of, 
the great painter has thrust it into unpleasant prominence. 
Do you remember the fault we found with a certain row of 
statues in the approach to the king’s palace near BlinrS ? 
Here we have to deplore the same deformity ; only here it is 
not ludicrous, although it is still indecent.” 

“ Yes, I wonder, how any modest woman can look at 
it,” 

“ Or look at it and remain modest. Here comes a party. 
Let us give place to them. Those two pretty young ladies, 
if they draw deductions from what they see, will not be 
benefited in a matter of general history any more than in 
the suggestions of chastity. It is nature, I assure them, but 
not the best nature; nor is the latter, as we see it in the 
statues of ancient high art, any more rare in vigorous man- 
hood than is the prominent length of the second toe. The 
matchless man-figure we saw dying in marble in the folds of 
the serpent makes a beast of this otherwise true hero of the 
painted Deluge.” 

“ But here,” resumed the schoolmaster, as they stood before 
a picture which represented the burial-scene in a once-popu- 
lar and always-fine romance of savage life, “ here is nothing 
to mar the pathos of the poetry. What beauty in the mental 
agony of the lover, who with closed eyes hangs desperately 
over the body of the young girl which the aged hermit-mis- 
sionary is about to commit uncoffined to the grave ! It is 
the extremity of manly passionate grief. And the calmness 
of that lovely face where, with no degradation from long ill- 
ness and no distortion from sharp pain, is the quiet of the 
Bleep of death ! ” 


OF ALETIIITHERAS. 


143 


Aletlii said nothing and turned not round. He could not. 
The face resembled that of one of his departed sisters, and 
liis heart was in his throat and in his eyes. 

“ Now,” continued the schoolmaster after a while, “ con- 
trast with this touching poem the unpleasant pomp of this 
picture of the old story of ancient Ariospolis. Those men, 
who fight stark naked with helmets on their heads, are ab- 
surdities of falsehood.” 

“ Yet he was a great painter who made this work.” 

“ The foremost of this country, in his day. But you see 
to what a passion for the classic may carry a man, blinding 
him to nature and making him insensible to truth and prob- 
ability. One figure naked yet armed, like the Mars Oradims 
of the intaglio you had stolen from you, would be tolerable 
and is understood. The mind adapts itself to the image 
presented as it does to unmixed allegory. But you introduce 
a second figure, and you add female figures fully robed, and 
the improbability of the scene overpowers all merit in the 
design and makes the composition censurable.” 

As they turned away, a similar occurrence awaited them 
to that which had varied their coming to the Gallery. Two 
well-dressed men were observing the travelers. One of them 
with an expression of great amusement measured the little 
schoolmaster from head to foot, then calling his companion’s 
attention to him by a significant look, gazed impertinently 
directly in his face. 

“For a polite people,” said the object of the insult aloud 
to Alethi, but facing the insulter, “ it seems to me the Lute- 
tians are very much given to staring.” 

“ They like curiosities,” replied the impertinent. 

“ So I should suppose,” said Philoscommon with emphatic 
significance. “ What do you ask for the exhibition ? ” 

“More than such as you would be able or willing to pay,” 
retorted the Lutetian contemptuously, yet with a flushed 
face, and eyes that explained perfectly his meaning. 


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“Try,” was the prompt but deliberate rejoinder: “you 
may find me richer and readier than you suppose.” 

As he spoke, Alethi, who was very much annoyed and only 
kept from anger himself by Pliiloscommon’s coolness, drew 
the little man away by the arm, whispering, “Remember 
your philosophy and never mind the buzzing of such flies.” 

“ I do not,” said Philos' with unconcern ; “ I only philo- 
sophically brush them away.” 

Alethi looked around, and saw a like movement taking 
id ace with the Lutetian, whose friend appeared by his ges- 
tures to be remonstrating, while the former, led away unre- 
sisting, replied only by shrugging his shoulders. 

“ Twice in one day,” said Philos', with a pleasant wreath- 
ing of his lithe proboscis : “ you will allow the modem 
Cecropians are fully a match for the old.” 

“ They are the most impertinent people I have yet seen,” 
said Alethi tartly. 

“ And the glibbest of tongue. The dogs are quick-witted.” 

“ Say you ? It is a reputation ill-acquired at the expense 
of benevolence.” 

“ Benevolence has nothing to do with it. A man may be 
witty and have both good-nature and benevolence, and he 
may be witty without either. He has then steel gaffl.es on his 
spm-s. I think the Lutetians have quite as much of either 
quality as most people, but they certainly are very apt to 
show a great want of both. Here you will encounter a deal 
of impertinence, set off with a garnish of sprightliness. In 
Chaunopolis you will find a great deal more, without any 
garnish at all, and often served in the rudest manner on the 
most trumpery kind of ware.” 

Some days afterward, they were walking soon after break- 
fast, when few persons were passing, in one of the widest 
streets, when suddenly a gentlemanly-looking man, who was 
approaching them, made a full stop, then, his whole face 
lighting up with pleasure, rushed to Alethi with an exclama- 


OF ALETHITHEKAS, 


145 


tion of joy, and clasped him in liis arms. “ My dear friend I ” 
he exclaimed, trying to kiss him on the cheek ; then, as Ale- 
thi struggled, “it so long since I beheld you ! ” 

“ The devil ! ” said the latter, breaking loose, “I never saw 
you in my life.” 

“Ah, wliat an error ! ” cried the stranger with an air of 
shame and mortification. “ Ten thousand pardons 1 ” With 
a profound bow, hat in hand, he was about to make off, when 
Philoscommon grasped him by the sleeve. 

“ Not so fast, our friend ! ” said the philosopher. 

“What do you mean?” said the stranger, trying in vain 
to remove the ugly fingers. “ It was a mistake.” 

“ No, a take. Hand back the watch.” At the same time 
the captor beckoned to one of the military police. 

Alethi’s watch was restored. The policeman took their 
address, and took away the thief. 

“Why, Philos' ! ” cried Aletlii, “we shall have to put you 
in the army ; you are getting a habit of it.” 

“Of what?” 

“ Of pluck” said Alethi, rather embarrassed. 

“And did you think I wanted it ?” 

“No, my dear fellow, I did not doubt your manhood” 

“O Mehetabel!” interejaculated the quondam admirer of 
the churchsteeple-mustard-pepperbox. 

< — “For I remember your coolness with the bandits.” — 

“ Except in one part,” said the philosopher, rubbing his 
gluteus w r ith memorial itch. 

“ Pshaw ! you put me out. You don't want my apology, I 
see.” 

“ Certainly not. But what were you going to say about 
my pluck ? ” 

“ Why, I never thought about it at all, either one way or 
the other. But it was you know so — so very odd, that a 
philosopher ” 

“ Should have common courage, that is it. But in fact, 
7 


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Alethi, it is habit. And I dare say, but for that first affair, 
I should not have been so prompt in this. Now, confound 
it ! we shall be obliged to stay here, and be put to more 
trouble than your turnip is worth. I wish I had let it go.” 

“ Thank you. And in return, I hope you may be kept here 
long enough to finish your labors in the Imperial Library. — • 
But that was not a bad trick of the Alectryon ? ” 

“ My dear f riend ! — A h, what an error ! — No. They cer- 
tainly do manage these things in Lutetia with infinite grace. 
The best exploit of the kind I ever heard of, was of one of 
these gentry who went into a mantuamaker’s shop and asked 
the mistress to show him some ladies’ dresses. He said he 
was about to be married, and wished to surprise his betrothed 
by a present of the handsomest one he could purchase. The 
woman showed him several, and he selected one of light 
material, a ball-dress, which pleased him greatly; but he 
modestly deferred to her opinion, confessing pleasantly his 
own ignorance in such matters, and lauding artfully the 
judgment and good taste of the shopkeeper as she indica- 
ted for his admiration this and that. ‘ If I only knew; ’ he 
said, ‘ if this would fit her. There is the difficulty. She is 
a very elegant person, and, as you may suppose, is rather 
particular as to fit. If there was only some one like her to 
try it on. Ah! how fortunate ! You are — indeed more so 
than any person I ever saw — like her in shape and height. 

Would you be so complaisant ? ’ ‘ To try it on ? With 

pleasure, sir.’ — 1 But pray don’t move from the shop. Just 
throw it over your head, and I can see in a moment 
how it will appear. As I said, she is a beautiful figure, and 

what will look well on you Ah, but that is charming ! 

Now the back a little.’ The woman turned. The fellow, put- 
ting his hands delicately on the waist of the dress and affect- 
ing to smooth it down, managed to fasten it securely with a 
large pin to the woman’s clothing, both upper and under. 
The instant this was done, he snatched up a roll of silk from 


OF ALETniTHERAS. 


147 


the counter and disappeared. The poor woman could not 
go after him so ridiculously attired. She attempted to draw 
the costly dress over her head, but found she was exposing 
her person. It was an hour when all her work-people were 
abroad ; and by the time she had loosened the pin, which 
her trepidation made it not easy to do, the rogue with his 
plunder was out of sight.” 


CHAPTER XXI. 

Philoscommon opens the booJc of Government for his compan- 
ion , who is disgusted and disheartened at what 
he reads there. 

“ Well,” said Philosc one day, “ what say you of Lute- 
tia?” 

“ It may be a pleasant place,” replied Alethi, “ for pleas- 
ure-seekers and those who love to forget themselves, but it 
has no charms for me.” 

“ So I should have thought.” 

“ Still, it is not a place to yawn in. But in one respect it 
surprises me. Everywhere there is quiet, everywhere the 
aspect of peace, yet everywhere I meet the bayonet.” 

“It is because the bayonet glitters everywhere, that every- 
where you see what looks like peace. Beneath this surface 
which is so dazzling and which looks so happy, there are the 
elements of convulsion. I know not but that, as in Parthen- 
op£, the greater the quiet the more reason one has to fear the 
earthquake.” 

“ Is it the turbulence of the people, or the despotism of 
the ruler ? ” 

“ Where the ruler is not despotic, one has rarely to fear 
from the turbulence of a people. In this great city, Alethi, 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


are gathered all the restless spirits of the land. In vain the 
press is muzzled, in vain the Argus of police has his hundred 
eyes forever open ; you cannot stifle liberty by bandaging 
her mouth, there is no spy with such plurality of vision, but 
sometime on some side the men and measures he is set to 
watch will find him blinded. There was a day when there 
plied no public press ; still further back in the benighted 
ages, a time when the reduplication of a writing by means of 
types was never dreamed of, yet in those days men thought, 
conspired, and rose in revolution just as now. What avails 
it to interdict opinion ? It can circulate through hidden 
channels, in a narrower current indeed, but the stronger per- 
haps for its restriction. You dam it up, the waters are but 
gathered into one place. Still through the obstacle some 
portion of the flood will trickle, and the danger always is, 
that, if the wier give way, you have suddenly a torrent for 
a rivulet, a resistless cataract for a feeble waterfall.” 

Alethi looked at him in silence. 

“You wonder to hear me talk thus,” pursued the little 
man with a smile. 

“ I was surprised at your elevation.” 

“ See what it is to have a bad name ! But in fact, I was 
on my war-horse, to do battle against the hypocrisy of this 
Government, which is forever proclaiming itself to be in the 
van of civilization, yet continues to be guilty of acts that 
would mark it to be retrograde but that the like are prac- 
ticed in Philautia. There is a rich island owned by Jactan- 
tia which is cultivated by slaves. Philautia, finding her 
own slave-possession in its neighborhood dwindling in im- 
portance, and the laborers rapidly decreasing in number, 
set the latter free ; and Alectoreion having lost hers, both 
these powers have become particularly excited by the atroc- 
ities of the slave-trade, and vehement in their abuse of Jac- 
tantia, which is supposed to connive at its secret mainte- 
nance. Yet both have attempted to press colored laborers 


OF ALETUITHERAS. 


140 


into their service by a sort of forced apprenticeship that is 
harder than slavery, and Philautia in fact is known to have 
sent for many recent years into various of her tropical colo- 
nies cargo after cargo of these unhappy blacks whom her 
own vessels had recaptured from the slavers; which you 
see may indirectly stimulate the trade itself.” 

“ Through the necessities of the colonies.” 

“ And the advantage in the shape of prize-money accru- 
ing to the captors. It is certainly a temptation both ways 
to let a cargo be shipped occasionally. Well, recently a ship 
of the Alectryons with such laborers on board was found in 
the neighborhood of a slave-coast, in waters which are 
watched by one of the weaker Powers who is ruler there. 
The circumstances were so suspicious, the blacks themselves 
declaring they were forced or beguiled on board, that the 
vessel was seized by this Power under the mutual law' pro- 
viding for such cases. But there was on board a delegate of 
the government of Alectoreion, and it was too monstrous to 
suppose that any sanction could be given by such a passen- 
ger to a violation of the law. And then did not the captain 
too maintain his innocence ? Consequently, the Alectryons, 
who in a similar case before, where the negroes had uprisen 
and seized the slaver, had been compelled to submit to the 
interference of Philautia and see them all returned as free- 
men to a new republic in their native land, being now the 
stronger Power, sent several vessels directly into the native 
waters of the feeble Power, which will be compelled to yield 
to all their demands. Philautia is notorious for a lust of 
territory which she never hesitates to gratify where she can 
do it in safety. Alectoreion has sent out an expedition to 
seize Han-San, the best harbor of the maritime province of 
a kingdom in Ta-pros-he'o.” 

“ But she has some pretext ? ” 

“0, certainly. In the last century, there was trouble 
there, and a missionary of the Alectryons who had become 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


a favorite and minister of the legitimate despot returned to 
his native land to ask for aid to his coppercolored master. 
But trouble still more serious occurred in his own country, 
and when finally a few of his Alectryons arrived, Caung- 
Shung, a most energetic and enlightened prince by the by r 
was in his proper seat. The opportunity however, though 
unprofited by, was too favorable to be forgotten. Two or 
three provinces will now be exacted. And that is all.” 

“ And is it after this fashion that these powerful nations 
act toward the weaker ? ” 

“ O my dear, this is but the beginning of the alphabet. 
Before we return to Medamou, you will have learned all the 
letters. Do you not see it is the mere fortune of the stronger 
nations that others are not able to resist them ? If Provi- 
dence had designed the contrary, why did it not make a 
parity of force ? Not to take advantage of their fortune 
would be a disregard of the celestial provision. As for 
blacks of every shade and nationality, and coppercolored 
highcheeked people w T ho have diagonally-set eyes, they are 
of no account whatever, except, like certain fishes, for their 
number; and to thin the shoals may be of advantage to the 
tribe, as w r ell as affording sport and profit for the captors 
and destroyers.” 

“But surely in a country, in a capital like this, where you 
allow there are so much intellect and shrewdness and the 
soundest moral and political knowledge, there must be many 
independent thinkers and some few courageous maintainers 
of the right.” 

“ Certainly, they are of the opposition to the Government. 
But how far do they go ? This morning there is an exposi- 
tion, a denouncement in mild but intelligible terms, of certain 
measures of the Government. To-morrow the liberal press 
will receive a warning, and, if this be disregarded, in a day 
or two you have the editor fined and imprisoned. Do an un- 
usual number of persons assemble in a private house to discuss 


OF ALETIITHERAS, 


151 


affairs of state, the police breaks up the meeting. Does some 
writer succeed by the disguise of a title in insinuating his 
views upon the public, the success of his pamphlet arouses 
suspicion, his publisher can escape imprisonment only by in- 
forming himself against the author, and the whole of the 
new edition is suppressed. Does another, bolder and having 
more regard to his reputation as a wit and sage than to his 
safety as a man, attack in terms unmeasured and unmistakable 
the corruptions of the court and the abuse of power, he is 
challenged to the death, and if one opponent fails to pierce 
his body, another stands ready, and yet another, to play the 
executioner through the imposing mode of a combat, where 
murder is not less done that it is done openly and under the 
laws of the duello. Add to all this, when all is said and all 
is written that can be written and be said for truth and right, 
are there not two to one, ay three to one, hired satellites of 
the Government , minions of power and parasites of place, 
who publish and who speak as loudly and as much, and in 
words perhaps as well, and who, having no conscience and 
no sense of honor, turn inside out, transform and color, sub- 
tract and add and multiply, vail with specious reasons, or 
slur over with affected oversight, the things they treat of, 
that falsehood shall put on the guise of truth, and wrong be 
made the sublimity of justice ? To hear them thunder, you 
would think that Heaven itself was roused in defence of po- 
litical virtue, and the lightning of their indignation seems 
ready to strike with merited annihilation the least wavering 
of believers in the immaculateness of the sovereign.” 

“ It is a picture which, I hope, applies to only Alectoreion.” 

“ It is a portrait which has the peculiarity of fitting, as 
you narrow or extend the frame, almost every other country, 
but in its actual proportions represents especially Philautia, 
and even Isopoliteia, though in the latter original there is 
this variety, that whereas this latter almost invariably confines 
its misrepresentations to itself, ra i vpoe iavrov , the two others 


152 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


extend tliem liberally to all other nations and particularly 
to this last one, which, if you believe their estimate, must be 
a colossal agglomeration of everything that is vile.” 

“When I reflect,” said Alethi, “ that historians are as likely 
to take the statements of one side as the other, it fills me with 
distrust, and with dismay. What is all history ? ” 

“ What but a tissue of calumnies, with here and there a 
silver thread of truth, crossing the particolored yet dingy 
fabric. What would you have it ? ” 

“ What it pretends to be.” 

“You have answered better than you thought. It is but 
pretence. Men scarcely find the truth. But few men seek it. 
Thousands feel themselves justified in lying for a favorite 
cause, while tens of thousands lie without caring for justifi- 
cation. It is, I am inclined to think, the normal condition 
of mankind.” 

“ What is ? ” 

“To lie.” 

Alethitheras looked sad. “I am forced to believe you. 
But you make me melancholy.” 

“ I did not make the world,” said Philoscommon. 


CHAPTER XXII. 

The Emperor of the Alectryons. Our travelers set out to go 
to the Opera , but are made spectators of an unfinished 
political tragedy in the public street. 

The younger traveler was unwilling to let the subject 
drop, and, after some moments, he thus resumed the conver- 
sation. 

“ And what is the monarch under whom such a state of 
things is allowed to exist ? ” 


OF ALETHITHERAS, 


153 


“ A state of tilings which I have but feebly penciled after 
all ; for dispatches from foreign parts are often falsified to 
form opinion, and, when with later news the contradiction 
comes, this is suppressed as long as possible, to keep the 
public mind in the required track. You look astonished, 
and may well ; but the same systematic falsehood has beexi 
practiced by the press in Philautia and upon the very same 
subject, the state of public affairs in the object of their terror 
and their hate, the giant republic of Isopoliteia. Would yc** 
now repeat your question ? The monarch could not haw* 
created this condition of things. Indeed I have said it exist* 
as vigorous in Philautia. Society must already be depraved 
where such a moral monster, which looks one way and seer* 
another, can have even birth. The monarch finding it useful 
suffers it to grow, and, without exactly employing it, takes ad- 
vantage of its services, while taking care that his servants 
shall watch it, lest in its unhesitating fury it turn upon him- 
self. In Philautia it is not the sovereign but the Govern- 
ment which has in secret service this foul creature ; here it is 
the monarch, for here there is no real government but the 
monarch.” 

“ You have answered then my question. He is a tyrant.” 

“ No, not in the received sense of that once innocent word. 
Neither is he what is called a despot ; but he is despotic. 
Bom a prince through usurpation, he is here a usurper, and 
the self-made successor of a usurper. A man of undoubted 
ability, but with the credit of having more than perhaps he 
really possesses, because he follows the maxim which teaches 
dissimulation to his kind, and, keeping his own counsel, 
avails himself of circumstances which he has not created nor 
even perhaps foreseen, but which are ascribed by his syco- 
phants to the force of his will guided by his foresight, un- 
scrupulously and when he thinks it necessary remorselessly 
ambitious, his heart was long set upon the power which he 
now enjoys. After repeated disappointment the adventurer 
7 * 


154 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


found, like liis relative the conqueror whom he pretends to 
have succeeded, but without any such show of service as the 
latter could put forward, the happy moment of revolution, 
and availed himself of it. Once made the head of a republic, 
but with the foolish and dangerous addition of a qualifying 
title which marked his claim to sovereignty, he soon found 
means to have his power made perpetual. The army then 
gained over, the ambition of individuals availed of, a stroke 
of state, as it was nicely called, w T hen blood was shed to aid 
a usurpation, the adventurer stood up a monarch though 
uncrowned, and though at first unrecognized and despised 
by other potentates and vehemently abused by their subjects, 
he has wrested from the prudence and the policy of all, if 
not from their fears, complete acknowledgment, and the 
sovereign herself of Philautia has lent her cheek to his kiss 
and bound her badge of highest honor on his knee.” 

“ Such a man can not be common.” 

“ No ; I acknowledged his ability. But remember, Aletlii, 
that where a man is determined to attain a certain height, 
and allows no obstacle to intercept him, he is surer of success 
than he who hesitates. Further, he excels in that antithetical 
style and that studied sententiousness which are favored by 
his people. He will generalize a whole campaign or the 
policy of a year into an abstract political maxim, and con- 
dense the prospective measures of his reign into a brief, 
sounding epigram. This gives brilliancy and a look of vigor 
to his speeches and letters, and makes his glittering unsub- 
stantialities pass for the dogmatism of recondite wisdom. 
Would you like to see this man ? ” 

“ By all means.” 

“ Commission me then to buy you a ticket for to-night’s 
opera. He is to attend it.” 

“ What is opera, Philos' ? ” 

“ It is the perfection of the lyrical drama, an expansion at 
once and sublimation of what charmed the Cecropians on 


OP ALETEITHEEAS, 


155 


tlieir ancient stage. But there are two kinds. The true 
opera, the opera of the Anastesians and after them of the 
Micromereians, is all music. You readily sympathize with 
the emotions of the characters, follow them without distrust 
through their chanted dialogue, and find no confusion or 
absurdity in that they love and fight and rave and die, all to 
the softest or the grandest strains elaborately composed and 
accompanied and partially rendered by fifty or sixty instru- 
ments. It is in fact as in the reading of poetry, where, with- 
out any surprise or dissatisfaction, you haye the hero threaten, 
swear, entreat his mistress and adore the gods, in rhyme, 
because all his actions from the first to the last and all that 
is related of him are done and presented in like manner. 
But in the other kind of opera, which is native here and to 
Philautia, you have the interlocutors conversing in ordinary 
unmeasured prose. All of a sudden the music strikes up and 
the speakers fall to singing, no matter what the subject or 
their emotions at the time, though the scene be the public 
highway or the parlor of a house where they are strangers. 
At this the mind is shocked, as at the impossible and the 
unnatural ; incredulus odit. If anything could redeem such 
nonsense, it would be the spirit of its perpetration here, where 
under a particular name we have this sort of hybrid produc- 
tion marked by the brightest sallies of wit, the most delicate 
humor, and a general vivacity and graceful lightness that 
are peculiar to this people. But I must off for the ticket.” 

“ Tickets. You must go along.” 

“ Do you want a scene not set down in the books ? ” 

“ No, but I don’t want through fear of a scene to commit 
a meanness. Either you go with me, Philos', and sit beside 
me too, or the play goes on without me.” 

“ There will be plenty of ladies,” said the philosopher, 
with a grin and a grimace ; “ but I think there will be too 
much of a foil about me. Remember, it is your own fault, 
if you be made to wish yourself in Medamou.” 


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It was their intention to go early, but owing to an acci- 
dent insignificant in itself it was after eight o’clock before 
they left the Satlirartos. The opera-house was but a few 
steps from that hotel, and they set off on foot. When near 
the street of their destination, they heard the sound of many 
horses’ hoofs, and, stopping at the edge of the crowd already 
gathered, saw in a few moments, driven past them at a rapid 
rate and surrounded by a body of lancers, the carriage of the 
Emperor. Working their way through the crowd, they 
were about to follow, when suddenly there was a loud and 
sharp explosion directly in the course of the carriage. The 
crowd receded. Philoscommon, laying his hand on the arm 
of Alethi, whispered him, “ Don’t move ! or rather, fall back. 
We have come perhaps to see a tragedy.” The whip had 
sounded, the carriage had dashed on up to the steps of the 
playhouse, and, as these words were spoken, there was a 
second explosion. They saw one of the horses drop. Then 
there was a third explosion : the windows crashed in the 
neighboring houses, the street lamps were extinguished, 
pieces of iron hurled through the air fell in the midst of the 
throng where our party stood, wounding several persons. 
But before their cries and groans were heard, and the loud 
orders of the officer of the guard, Alethi had distinguished the 
sound of the carriage-steps, and again Philoscommon whis- 
pered, “ He is probably safe.” Then the crowd commenced 
to disperse, and pressed by the horsemen surged backward 
like a receding wave. Alethi and Philoscommon, retreating 
with them, helped into a shop a poor fellow whose legs had 
been cut badly, and before their good work was completed 
they heard the galloping of horses, and saw a squadron of 
mounted guards with drawn sabres hurrying to the scene. 

“You will hardly get in now,” said Philoscommon. 

“ Nor do I want to,” responded Alethi. “ I have had enough 
of the Emperor, and have no stomach for the play. He is 
safe you think. What an escape ! ” 


OF ALETHITHERAB. 


157 


“ The Devil, you know, is said to be good to his own.” 

“ Philos' ! You can’t approve of this dastardly and mur- 
derous way of effecting a revolution ? ” 

“ Not more than you, Alethi. If it rested with me, every 
one who had the least hand in the conspiracy ( as I suppose 
it) would have but a short shrift. Nothing ever did justify 
assassination. It is all sophism that is used to palliate it. 
And here are perhaps a dozen murders of persons inoffensive 
and unknown to the assassins, and wounds and mutilation, 
and the slaughter of dumb animals, all to compass the de- 
struction of one man. That man is undoubtedly guilty, 
guilty of usurpation and guilty of despotism, and well 
deserves his death if ever despot and usurper did, but not in 
this way, not by these hands. If one wrong can be held to 
justify another, where will men stop, or who shall set a limit 
to the means when the end alone is made the sanction for 
their use ? Come, it will not do to loiter here, especially as 
we are foreigners. I am sorry though, we did not get in. 
It would have been worth your seeing, the mien of the 
monarch.” 

“ Do you think then he entered the house ? ” 

“ Certainly. It is a part he would delight to play. He 
has perfect self-command ; and I dare say you would see the 
ladies of the court examining curiously pieces of the explo- 
ded shells.” 

“ And what will be the result of this atrocity ? ” 

“ What would you suppose ? ” 

“ The tightening of the reins of government, which will 
probably be stronger than before.” 

“ And more despotic. When a mettlesome horse tries to 
unseat his rider and fails, the latter plies both spur and 
curb, and becomes still more the master than before. To « 
morrow all parts of the country will be interchanging congrat- 
ulations ; the next day new edicts will be issued against the 
Press which will extend their action even to foreign parts.” 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ But not to be obeyed ? ” 

“ Yes, by the weaker Powers directly ; and even Philautia, 
though reluctantly and after indignant protestation, will 
forget her boasted right of asylum, (a right by the by which 
this very Emperor had enjoyed when himself a fugitive,) 
and lend her courts of justice and police to neutralize that 
hospitality which has, it is true, been often abused; nor 
should I be at all surprised if the Postoffice, one of the 
most admirably systematized and conducted of its institu- 
tions, should be called upon to violate the confidence that is 
placed in the integrity of its management.” 

“ By breaking the seals of private dispatches ? ” 

“ What else ? And will do it.” 

“ Impossible ! in a country strong and haughty as you de- 
scribe Philautia.” 

“ Alethi, if a man were to insult you who had it in his 
power to ruin or destroy you, you would pocket the insult.” 

“ No ! ” 

“ You think so. So does every man of honor and of spirit 
think. But let him be dependent on the goodwill of another 
who holds his happiness and his very life in his hands, he 
will find in his soul somewhere a spot of baseness which he 
has never suspected, and if it be to save his family, or him- 
self, he will bend before an aggression that in another person 
he would resent to the death. States are but the aggregates 
of individuals, and the image that is given forth by the soul 
of one of them is reflected in the many-faced mirror which 
multiplies them all.” 

“ From the sadness you make me feel, I fear that you are 
right. I almost wish that we were back in Medamou.” 

“ No, not yet,” cried the schoolmaster, laughing. “ Wait 
till you have floundered through the fogs and egotism of 
Philautia, skimmed over the dirt and degradation of Tapros- 
h€o, and plodded weary and bewildered in the turmoil, the 
whirr and buzz of many-wheeled and ever-working Isopol- 


OP ALETHITHER AS. 


159 


iteia ; and then, when we shall have gained the object of 
our travel, we will return to Medamou and dip our hands in 
its obliterating Lethe where alone is found the water of ab- 
solute contentment.” 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

They arrive in Septicollis, and after a pleasant sojourn 
leave from a seaport of the country for Chau - 
nopolis , and find on "board the packet a 
notorious female character. 

It was as Philoscommon had predicted. In all the neigh- 
boring countries measures of suppression and restraint sig- 
nalized the prudence or the timorousness of governments. 
Where the Press was collared and chained it now was muz- 
zled, where individuals were under supervision they were 
taken up and incarcerated, spies watched on the frontier, 
and police detectives searched the strangers’ quarters in the 
interior ; the republic of the mountains drove out the men 
it was not big enough to dare retain, and proud and over- 
bearing Philautia sunk its first tone of indignation and de- 
fiance to a murmur of gruff assent, 'and allowed the myr- 
midons of a rival Power to dictate to its own servants meas- 
ures that restrained the liberty of the subject and forced 
from their hospitable retreats the political fugitives whom, 
with all their spirit of intrigue and factious declamations, 
it had hitherto been proud to shelter. 

“ The little kingdom we shall next visit,” said the school- 
master, “ has repaid its obligation to the Power which with 
Philautia helped by robbery to form it, by suppressing out- 
right three insignificant journals. Septicollis, its capital, 
was somewhat conspicuous for its independence in letters ; 


160 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND 


LAND 


but the little country is too weak to take exception to the 
insinuated threat of conterminous Alectoreion; so down 
went The Red Rag , The Shark no longer cut its swift way 
through the depths of journalism, and From-Eand-to-Mouth 
ceased to dictate to its scanty subscribers the communistical 
principles they could not understand. It is a littleness, the 
call for the annihilation of these pigmies, that shows the 
would-be Caesar in his true light. He may be Augustus, but 
he certainly is not Julius.” 

They arrived in Septicollis during the three-days’ festi- 
val of the independence of the country. In the Square near 
their lodging, a huge pear-shaped globe of varnished silk 
was filling with the inflammable vapor from the pipes which 
supplied the streets with light. The process was prudently 
slow, and evening had set in before the great oblong ball, 
swaying uneasily between its fastenings as if it longed to 
burst them, was sufficiently distended. Into the kind of 
boat or basket which was attached below its narrower end 
and mouth sprung now an agile Alectryon, who seemed as 
impatient as the air-bag itself. Hurriedly, but silently, he 
disentangled it, and as it rose rapidly into the atmosphere 
he lighted a mass of fireworks, which began to blaze and 
burst around his little boat, and filled the heart of Alethi, 
to whom his companion had explained the nature of the 
subtile gas by whose superior levity the mass ascended, with 
great uneasiness. 

“ He is paid for it,” said Philoscommon ; “ his vanity and 
his folly have at least some substantiality in equipoise.” 

“ It is not innocent foolhardiness,” said Alethi, “ and should 
be forbidden.” 

“ Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas ,” replied the school- 
master: “right or wrong, forbidden or permitted, men mil 
always be found to peril their lives, whether on a tight-rope 
across the abyss of a cataract, or by swallowing jackknives, 
so long as their fellows are ready to receive the excitement 


OF ALETHITHEBAS. 


161 


of beholding them. And this in the nature of things is in- 
evitable. Eh ! that spark was very near ! That fellow can 
have no fear of hell-fire. Not long since, Alethi, one of these 
air-sailers had a horse fastened to the bottom of the car, as 
they call that basket, and ascended sitting on his back. 
Still more daring, another after ascending got out and hung 
by his heels with his head down, then nimbly resumed his 
former position again.” 

“ And what is the use of all this aerostation ? ” 

“ Nothing as yet. But the time may come, when this may 
seem to what succeeds as simple, as the philosopher’s basket 
in which he woos the Clouds in the play would be to this. 

Aepo/?arw Kai tt epujfpovu tov rj'kiov.” 

“ Why, you don’t suppose they will ever find the means to 
guide such a vessel against the winds ? ” 

“ I suppose nothing. But I should not be quite thunder- 
struck if they did. No man stares at the steamengine now, 
though it drives great vehicles on both the land and sea. A 
poet of Philautia once predicted that it would drive air-cars 
also. Yet the day is not so distant in the past, when men 
jeered the very idea of vaporboats. There ! our daring navi- 
gator is quite out of sight, his fireworks being all extinguished. 
And so, as you are relieved, let us wander among the shops 
of this pretty city ; and if you do not pronounce the keepers 
the politest pickpockets in the world you will have better 
luck or less taste than I had.” 

Leaving their inn, they took pleasant lodgings on one of the 
leveled and planted ramparts and for nearly two months re- 
mained in the handsome but inanimate city, then, traveling 
further north, visited the moated town where is the most 
famous picture of one of the two great colorists, and took 
passage finally at the chief seaport of the kingdom for the 
great metropolis of Philautia. 

On board the packet, a young Philautian coming up to our 
party said in a low tone to Alethi, while he indicated a man 


1G2 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


and woman who were pacing the deck: “ Did you know that 
we have on board the woman who helped her husband to 
murder her own brother ? ” 

“ The case of poisoning with nicotin, you mean.” 

“ Yes ; that is the Countess. How curiously these things 
leak out ! I don’t know who first on board discovered her, 
but everybody is telling his neighbor that there is Madame 
I forget her present name.” 

“ And who is that stout, smooth-faced, hypocritical and 
sensual looking man with her ? ” 

“ O, that is the man who proposed to her after the execution 
of the Count. A jolly fellow, is n’t he ? and a bold one to 
marry such a murderess.” 

“ They are well-paired, I should think. He looks to be a 
mere animal, and she to be just the woman who would choose 
him.” 

“ She is no beauty, certainly. But she has caused quite an 
excitement among ns.” And the young gentleman went off, 
to impart with equal eagerness the news to some one else. 

On arriving at their destination, all the passengers were 
assembled in the custom-house, waiting each one his turn. 
The day was damp and raw, and as our party entered the 
room, they saw the woman alone sitting down with her foot 
upon the fender of the grate, where a small fire had been 
kindled. Several young men were staring at her and talking 
of her crime with intentional plainness; one, a Juveman, 
who had been taking too many morning drams, even peering 
impudently under her bonnet. She never lifted her head, 
but sat with an anxious and gloomy look on her thin and 
rather dark visage, biting her lip, and tapping nervously 
with her small and well-shaped foot the rounded edge of the 
fender. 

Aletlii thought this indecent conduct in the young men, 
and unmanly, as the woman for the moment was unprotected, 
and drew Philoscommon away. 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


163 


“It is,” said the latter, “the just punishment of her 
crime.” 

“And a severe one, if she meets it everywhere. It is 
something like the brand of Cain in the Hebrew hagiology.” 

“ Precisely like it, I should think. Who can pity her ? ” 

“ I do, while I turn from her with abhorrence. Where can 
the fratricide find rest ? ” 

“ Why, on the bosom of sensuality, as she has sought it 
there, — if indeed she wants it.” 

“ Do you doubt that ? ” 

“ I do. You see her agitated. It is wounded pride, it is 
the sense of degradation. Conscience, which is not a uni- 
versality, may have no voice whatever in her heart. It is a 
fine thing to talk of, Alethi ; but such crimes, we may be 
sure, are never perpetrated by those who are endowed with 
it. That however is not worth discussing. What I want 
you to remark is, that here is another instance of the ease 
with which a woman in modern times escapes the death-sen- 
tence.” 

“ Is it so everywhere ? ” 

“Very generally; less so perhaps in Philautia. But in 
Isopoliteia a woman may blow a man’s brains out at any 
time with perfect impunity, and perhaps be kissed in open 
court by her counsel after the trial.” 


164 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

In Chaunopolis : where Alethi himself has a painful expe- 

Hence of what his fellow-traveler underwent in Lutetia. 

They arrived at last in. Chaunopolis. 

“Well?” said Pliiloscommon interrogatively, one day as 
they stood before the cathedral dedicated to the Apostle of 
the Gentiles. 

“ There are three things,” replied Alethi, “ that I think 
truly wonderful, for they are the only things that ever made 
me wonder ; the ocean ; that narrow street we just have 
threaded, with its endless train of vehicles, its continuous 
crowd, and its ceaseless roar and murmur ; and now the out- 
side of this truly magnificent pile. I like it better than that 
erected to the brother saint in antiquated Ariospolis.” 

“ Good. So two of the three are here. But before you 
have done with Chaunopolis you will see much more to stare 
at, if not to admire.” 

“ But to wonder at ? ” 

“ Why I have prepared you too well to expect it, for that. 
Here, you ^ere taken, as on the ocean, by surprise. Let us 
go in.” 

Alethitheras was greatly pleased with the Chaunopolitans, 
although his landlady did conceive an affection for his tea 
and sugar, and would when winter came, his friend assured 
him, be equally amiable to his coals if he paid for them by 
the scuttle, and notwithstanding that in his dealings with 


OF ALE THITHER AS. 


165 


tlie quiet tradesmen he found them quite as wide awake as 
their lively brethren of Septicollis. He was particularly 
struck with the aspect of the city on that day which is set 
apart for religious services by all Jesousian communities. 
Nowhere as here had he seen it so respected. The good 
order, the decent stillness, the almost absolute suspension of 
traffic, and the cleanly attire of the lower classes charmed 
him, and made him, who was not bred to the religion of the 
place, sympathize in his own way with their devotion. 

On the evening of such a day, he went alone to one of the 
principal churches, and ascending to the gallery was shown 
respectfully to a large pew near the organ. Directly adjoin- 
ing this, at right angles with it, was another large pew, lined 
and cushioned like it. wherein was a gentleman with several 
little boys. The gentleman, looking at Alethi, made one of 
the boys hand him a book of prayer. This our traveler, 
who was well-read in the language of the country, gratefully 
accepted. When the service was over, instead of handing it 
back to the boy, he extended it, bowing his thanks, to the 
gentleman himself. Instantly, this person drew himself up 
with a haughtiness that brought the blood painfully into the 
stranger’s cheek. 

“I was indeed in error,” said the latter to his friend, 
“ when I returned it to him instead of to his son. But, the boy 
being nearest to me, how could I know the parent wished to 
avoid the condescension of offering it himself? It does not 
speak well, Philos', for the social condition of this great 
country, when pride can commit a rudeness almost insulting 
in the very temple of him who taught all pride to be sinful.” 

“ This is but a small specimen,” replied the schoolmaster, 
rubbing down his calves. “ If there be anything that marks 
a Pliilautian of good standing more than another, it is this 
fear to be gracious towards an unknown person who may by 
possibility be not in so desirable a position. This Jesousian 
saw you were a man of birth and breeding ; but, as you took 


166 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


the book and read in it, he probably came to the conclusion 
that you were his countryman. You being then unknown, he 
feared to go too far. For the rudeness of his reserve, as I say, 
it is but a small specimen. You may see greater insolence, 
without the previous good feeling evinced by your gentleman 
in the temple, especially if you have me with you. Lutetia 
has not the monopoly of the article.” 

Soon after this little but significant incident, there was a 
levee at the Palace. Alethi with his friend was walking in 
one of the grand streets which are almost at all times bare of 
pedestrians, when there came along a state-carriage with the 
coachman in full livery, with cocked hat and powdered wig, 
and three lackeys on the footboard similarly arrayed. In 
the interior was a young man bareheaded, in scarlet coat 
covered with orders. When Alethi saw him, he had his eyes 
fixed on Philosc with a most amused expression. Alethi 
looked indignant. Instantly the noble turned the same 
look upon him, but with a still greater impertinence in his 
bold but fine eyes. The carriage rolled on. 

Philosc turned full upon Alethi, who had stopped in the 
street, his cheek flushed and eye flashing. “You wish to 
follow that impertinent, ” he said. “ Do you know what it 
would lead to? He would have you whipped out of his 
great gate by the porter.” Alethi, with a deeper red in his 
cheek and his lips compressed, caught the schoolmaster by 
the shoulder and looked into his eyes. “ I see,” continued 
the latter, “ I have stung you. But it was not meant, Alethi ; 
I spoke but the fact. That officer is the greater specimen of 
that of which you had the less the other night. In pride, 
the nobility and gentry of this realm go beyond those of any 
other. The insolence is peculiar to the individual, not to 
the species. That fellow was not a gentleman, were he a 
field-marshal, and the richest duke in the kingdom. Indeed 
he may be really but the son of a menial, — ovku yap ng kov 
yovov avTO£ aveyvui — for it 's a wise child that knows its 'proper 


OP ALETHITH E'R A S . 


107 


father , and I dare say that not one half of these putative 
nobles have any legitimate right to their coronets. Forget 
him, you who in the eyes of God are a nobler man in every 
sense than he.” 

A night or two after this, the friends were walking in an- 
other street, one brilliant with the light of many shops. 
Suddenly Alethi felt a shock which threw him against the 
schoolmaster, and he saw move by him, then turn saucily 
around and retreat rapidly backward on his heels, a young 
man in livery who had purposely run against him, a*t full 
speed, with his shoulder. Scarcely had our traveler recovered 
his equanimity when again the shock, and he saw the same 
lackey running by in the same manner. It would have been 
folly to pursue him. The rascal knew that, and had come 
round purposely a second time for this amusement. 

“I would have given a good deal to trip him up,” said 
Alethi, still discomposed. 

“You would then, and would now, but not I think to- 
morrow. That fellow but avenges on you, who he sees are 
his superior, the arrogance and want of charity he is obliged 
to submit to hourly from his own master. He is a scoundrel, 
not the less ; and there are thousands such and of his dirty 
kind in Chaunopolis. And this, Alethi, is specimen No. 3. 
I hope it will be the last — for your sake ; for it does not 
amuse you.” 

“Does it you ? ” 

“ Setting you aside, it w T ould ; for I hold these Philau- 
tians to be in the matter of self-assumption, pride, and arro- 
gance, the greatest fools in all creation. That they are not 
harmless ones, it is true, we have just seen in the malice of 
that miserable monkey. His outrage was the natural fruit 
of the f’U-blown self-sufficience of his betters.” 


168 


TBAYELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER XXV. 

Alethitheras makes a pleasant acquaintance , witnesses a ten- 
der scene in the comedy of high life , hears a native 
orator , and becomes cognizant of various other 
products of an advanced civilization. 

In one of those lovely parks which decorate a single end 
of the great metropolis, and afford wholesome air and re- 
creation to those alone ( as Philoscommon observed ) who 
least need them, the friends were seated, their faces toward 
the stream which wanders through it. On the smooth 
gravel-walk before them, a number of sparrows were busy 
picking up the crumbs which an old sailor, who had the 
privilege to row people over the stream, was distributing to 
them from the door of his boat-house. When the man, a 
fine, stout, ruddy specimen of the native mariner in his 
proper uniform of navy-blue, called the little twitterers to 
him, they came one after another unhesitatingly into his box. 
Then he drove them back, crying, “Not you, not you. 
Come, Jack.” Immediately, a single bird among them an- 
swering to the name hopped upon the sill alone, and was 
welcomed with a meal. There was a gentlemanly-looking 
man, of grave demeanor and about Alethi’s age, seated on 
the other end of the bench, and at this familiarity of the 
sparrow, he turned and exchanged a pleasant smile with our 
travelers. Thereupon there ensued a conversation, and 
when Alethi with his friend arose the stranger rising too 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


169 


walked on with him, talking still. He was evidently an 
accomplished man, but by the lines of his face, and a cer- 
tain severity which occasionally crossed his otherwise pleas- 
ant talk, had seen trouble. He pleased Alethi particularly 
inasmuch as he betrayed no surprise at Philoscommon’s ec- 
centric appearance, and when the latter took his share in 
the conversation darted on him a quick, observing, and 
withal gratified look, which showed that he appreciated his 
rare qualities. The acquaintances parted at the gate, with 
a mutually expressed wish that they might meet again. 

And meet again they did, the very day after on the very 
same spot, but Alethi and the stranger alone ; for the school- 
master was busy at the great library which is one of the 
richest treasures and truest ornaments of the royal city. The 
two men met with a smile, they walked together, they sat 
down together, and then walked again for more than an 
hour, Alethi more and more charmed, and the Philautian 
not unpleased ; and, when this time they parted, they ex- 
changed addresses, and the Philautian, learning that his new 
acquaintance was a stranger in the country, promised to 
make the first visit. 

Our travelers had very pleasant lodgings in a small street, 
one end of which, on their left, was crossed by a great 
trading-thoroughfare and the other by a wide and fashion- 
able street abutting in a fashionable square. They occupied 
the entire first and second floors ; for Alethi had set his face 
resolutely against further traveling with Philoscommon as 
his servant, even in exclusive Philautia ; so their bedrooms 
were contiguous above, and the drawingroom-floor made 
their parlors, in which they were served by their landlady’s 
sister, whom, by the by, in the autumn, Alethi one day 
caught stealing his coals as his companion had predicted. 
But this was nothing, as he had been used to a like familiar- 
ity with his wood in Monachopolis. The corner of the 
street opposite and on their right hand was filled by the 
8 


170 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


mansion of a nobleman, whose ground, shut in from the 
street by a heavy brick wall, but open to them at their 
height, was pleasantly planted with great trees on whose 
tops the daws had built their solitary nests, which when the 
boughs w'ere bare showed like old handleless baskets black 
with the smoke and weather, or like clumps of twigs and 
dirt which the winds had gathered there, accessories not pic- 
turesque, but from association not displeasing. One of the 
windows of the mansion, whose rear formed the half of a 
hexagon, was diagonally and laterally opposite their own. 
One day, -when Alethi was busy w r ith the Weathercock, the 
great newspaper of Chaunopolis, and so called from turning 
in every direction according to the wind or breeze of events, 
sometimes whirling round to all points in the twenty-four 
hours, so as to be, what it pretended, a perfect representa- 
tion of the times, Pliiloscommon, who, leaning back in his 
chair in his favorite uncouth fashion, with now one, now 
another, often again both of his legs, over one of the arms, 
had his eyes on the noble’s window, where on a sort of 
lounging seat or half-sofa reclined a lady apparently an in- 
valid, attended by a maidservant, saw approach her a young 
man whose powdered hair and white cravat marked his situ- 
ation as a lackey. The lady having dismissed the maid as 
he entered was now fanning herself, and at her direction the 
youth, who was handsome, set down on a stand a silver salver 
which he had brought in, took the fan and began to wave 
it for her over her face, which was greatly flushed. There 
was something in the look of the lady and the mien of the 
servant which made the schoolmaster call to Alethi, who 
arose and stood beside him. At that very moment, Alethi 
to his horror, and Philoscommon to his delight, saw the 
servant at a signal from the lady’s lips lean forward and 
kiss her full on the mouth. 

“D — n her!” cried Alethi. “So shamelessly too, in the 
open window.” 


OF ALETHI THEKAS. 


171 


“ Slie had no time to think of h«r neighbors, who are be- 
sides too insignificant to have entered her ladyship’s head,” 
said Philos 7 , who, getting dow T n from his perch as Alethi 
turned his back on their lookout, had made a demi-pirouette 
on the hearth-rug to express his glee. “ Why should you 
damn her, poor feverish thing ? It is a prescription perhaps 
of her doctor’s ” 

“ Of her passions,” interposed Alethi, in huge disdain. 

“Which is more reasonable, being of nature,” subjoined 
the philosopher. “ Have you forgot the other Philautian 
lady on the ramparts in Septicollis ? ” 

“ No ; but that makes it worse,” said Alethi. “ It shows it 
to be too common.” 

“As the air,” said Philos'; “or rather, as spiced dishes 
and high wines with the wealthy.” 

They had in fact been in the habit of seeing a buxom, 
full-bosomed young lady in Amazon costume riding alone 
under their ■windows w T ith a young groom in unbecoming 
familiarity at her side ; both mounted superbly, especially 
the man, on thoroughbred Philautian horses. One morning 
they saw the same lady attended by a man old enough per- 
haps to be her father, but not too old to be her husband, 
stately almost to haughtiness, tall, well-made, and very 
noble-looking, and sitting his horse like a real gentleman. 
Behind them rode the groom, a plain, plebeian-looking, mid- 
dle-sized but strongly-built young fellow, at ten horses’ length 
distance. One of the tow T n-gates, between its tw^o offices 
of the internal customs, was at a very little distance oppo- 
site ■where our friends stood, not much more indeed than the 
noble’s window they had just now looked at, and in the 
same direction. As the lady and gentleman were about to 
pass through, the lady looked back with a significant and 
triumphant smile at the groom, who cast down his eyes and 
head and smiled too, but demurely. This exchange of sig- 
nals, -with the peculiar bluish darkness and sensuous look of 


172 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


tlie eyes of both, which Philoscommon had made him ob- 
serve, told Alethi unmistakably the story of the past night. 
“ I would I durst tell him,” he had then exclaimed. And he 
repeated now the same expression. 

“ You would have no right, if you durst,” replied the phil- 
osopher. “ What is it to you, if there are cuckolds in the 
world, you are none ? though ” He stopped. 

— “I came very near being one,” said Alethi. “ It is 
properly suggested. But I had nearly forgotten JMinnchen. 
Let her, with those two perfidious women, pass forever from 
our minds.” 

“ Only first let me remind you of what I said of the inso- 
lent peer in the state-carriage. You see that a man may 
very well ride in a fine state-coach who ought to drive it, 
and a gentleman who betrays a malevolence of temper, and 
indulges in a vulgarity of conduct which would be unbeara- 
ble though natural in his groom, may perhaps thank for them 
the extreme condescension of his mother. Don’t rail at the 
world, Alethi ; it is as it was in the days of the Book of 
Genesis and of the wanderings of Odysseus. 

M.7jTT}p fiev t’ efze <j>7]ot tov eiipevai, avrap eyuye 
Ovk oid’ • ovttu yap Tig kov yovov avTog aveyvu.” 

“ You are a scandalous fellow,” said Alethi, with a smile. 

“ Thanks to Mehetabel. I have had wrongs,” quoth the 
schoolmaster majestically; “‘facit indignatio' versum.’ — 
But since I have put you in pleasant humor again, hear that 
fellow — and look at him too. He is a curiosity.” 

Alethi faced the window, first looking sideways at the 
sick lady, -whom the valet was still fanning and talking to. 
In the middle of the roadway was a man bareheaded, dressed 
in a suit of black cloth, clean, but glazed and threadbare, 
and holding by the hand on either side of him a little boy. 
And thus he talked, at the top of his voice, with the clear 
utterance and generally exact pronunciation which belongs to 
the people of the metropolis, but -with a semi-theatrical, 


OF ALETHITDEKAS. 


173 


pompous and conceited tone, to which the upturned face — ■ 
which did not indicate poverty any more than his muscular 
figure — gave additional expression: . . “I cannot see 

how in G — Almighty’s providence any man has the right 
to deny me the right to live. Am I not a man ? I have not 
gold, ’tis true, nor silver, but, as the poet says, ‘ A man ’s a 
man for a’ that.’ What then am I to do ? I came not into 
the world by my own volition ; it was the will of Providence 
and the act of my parents. Being here, in the world, the 
w T orld owes me a living. Does it give it me? ‘Work,’ 
you w T ill say. Ah, that is easy to say. The little princess 
wondered why the people should starve for bread when such 
nice cakes were to be had. I cannot get work. I cannot 
steal ; if to beg I be not ashamed, the law steps in and for- 
bids me, — the law that should shield me and fight for me 
as well as for the rich ! But the law shields only them, the 
rich, and fights against me whom God made of the poor. 
Thus, shut out from labor, hindered from direct solicitation 
by the agents of the law, I must either starve, — but that the 
cries of my children or the gnawing of my own entrails 
would prohibit, — or by my own utterance, while I peram- 
bulate the streets, make known my struggles with adversity, 
in hopes that my condition may touch the hearts of those 
who, bom like me, — for come we not into the world, all of 
us, naked and empty ? — have, unlike me, more than the 
wherewithal to cover their nakedness and to fill up the 
stomach, which must have daily food, or else we die.” And 
so on he continued, without any break as if he searched his 
memory or sought for ideas or for expressions, until he was 
out of hearing. 

Scarcely was he gone before a dull turn turn was heard ; 
and there came along a turbaned and cotton-clad native of 
the East, with a tam-tam suspended horizontally like a min- 
iature wine-barrel from his neck, and beating both ends mo- 
notonously and lugubriously with his extended fingers or 


174 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


his clenched fists, to a monotonous and most lugubrious chant. 
His little child beside him looks around, but neither asks 
for the charity they expect. It is forbidden. 

Scarcely were our travelers gone up stairs to dress for a 
walk, when were heard in the street rude voices loudly sing- 
ing. “ What ! more yet ? ” cried Alethi, whose room was in 
front. “ Come here, Philos'. 1 ’ 

Three sturdy beggars were walking abreast in the middle 
of the street, in smock frocks and with necks like bulls and 
heads like bullets, both bare. They hold a narrow sheet of 
paper on which the words of a song are printed, and roar 
out ludicrously, all in unison, some stanzas, not necessarily 
in the song, to some air popular with the vulgar. There is a 
pause in the song. A servant steps up to them and exchanges 
a copper coin for one of the ballads, and you hear a “ Thank 
you, sir,” as deferential, though not quite as low in tone, as 
if it was rendered to a lord. These too are beggars ; and 
by their looks they earn a substantial living, in which a suf- 
ficiency of malt-liquor is not forgotten ; but, like the rest, 
they are not permitted to solicit charity directly. 

“ I think that will do for one day and one street,” said the 
younger traveler as he put on his hat. 

“For one street it may,” responded the older; “but for 
one day, — why, you may see a dozen forms of mendicancy 
every day and as many more at night.” 

They went to stroll in the pleasant garden attached to the 
Palace where the reigning sovereign was born. It communi- 
cates with the gayest of the public parks. As they passed 
up the great street which stretches by both park and garden, 
they saw, under the windows of a large hotel, a native of one 
of the realms of Taprosheo sitting crouched together and 
gathered up, so as to be in fact folded or doubled upon 
himself, in his white cotton dress, with his turbaned head 
bent down upon his crossed limbs toward the pavement, so 
that only his dark-brown neck, but not his face, was visible. 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


175 


“Return an hour hence,” said Philoscommon, “and you 
■will find him in the same posture, which you would think it 
impossible to keep for ten minutes at a time. And there he 
is, and thus he sits, in the same thin dress in winter as in 
summer. How abject, yet how touching! He carries you 
instantly in thought to the land where millions of his fellows 
are held in bondage, first to their native rulers, then to these 
haughty islanders, their conquerors .” 

In the evening their sympathies are again appealed to. 
Directly in the dry kennel, — perhaps in studied humility, 
perhaps as not permitted to obstruct the walk, — stands with 
mournful look, but silent, motionless, and uncomplaining, a 
decent young woman, in full black, with three children, all 
attired in fresh and equally deep mourning. Whether she is 
a widow or not, He, w r ho sees the hypocrite as well as the 
sincere and unpretending, alone knows. But this is her way 
to collect an alms or to practice her trade. And now comes * 
this young man with a little stationery in his hand. How 
pleasantly, yet how sadly he speaks ! in those clear accents 
and with that careful and correct enunciation which makes 
the Philautian tongue of Chaunopolis so delightful. “ Do, 
dear gentlemen, do buy a pencil of a poor fellow ! ” They 
pass him, but not willingly. “ Thank you, sirs, all the same.” 
It is said so submissively, yet with so sweet melancholy, 
that Alethi turns about, his hand in his pocket, and gives 
liberally, nor does Philosc attempt to restrain him. “ Ah, 
thank you, sir. God reward you ! I am sure you will not 
miss it, and it will do me much good.” 

“ That may be, either way,” said Philoscommon, as they 
turned again ; “ but it does not matter ; you would have had 
it all the same.” 

“ Why, I thought you did not disapprove.” 

“ Nor did I. If you had not given, I should have done it 
myself. He fairly earned it, or there are no fees for orators. 
Some of these fellows would draw the very soul out of your 


176 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


body, if it were loose. You go out in tlie morning resolved 
not to give a copper, but before you return in the evening 
you are lighter by some pieces of silver, even if your stomach 
has to sympathize. I was once going very hungry to an eat- 
ing-house, when one of these charity-rhetoricians — it was a 
girl, by the by — accosted me in the park I was crossing. I 
told her I had nothing to give and would give nothing. 
She pressed the more, following me all the time. I then 
took the wiser part of silence. But still she followed. 
There was no constable in sight, or the police were not so 
active in those days. At last, by mere importunity, for she 
had none of the pathos and persuasiveness of this pencil- 
vender and could merely whine and weep, the girl succeeded. 
‘Here,’ said I, ‘is the price of my dinner. If you are 
not hungry, don’t take it, for I am ; if you are, you want it 
more than I and are welcome.’ The remorseless creature 
, took it, and I dare say spent it in drink, while I lay awake 
that night for two hours, listening to the murmurs of my 
disappointed bowels, and recognizing myself at last for the 
fool I had not yet believed I was.” 

“It is better, however, to be sometimes imposed upon, 
than to deny our aid to those who may be really in want of 
it.” 

“ No doubt, especially if you can do it without hurting 
yourself. But here, Alethi, if one make it a practice to 
give to all who ask, he will need to have an almoner with 
him.” 

“ Why surely this day’s experience is exceptional. It is 
with us.” 

“ Because as yet we have walked but little, except where, 
as you saw by the board at the gate, shabby-looking people 
are not admitted. I don’t know if Chaunopolis is the Para- 
dise of beggars ; but they obey here the injunction that was 
given in Paradise, and increase and multiply. What you 
have seen to-day, disagreeable and multiform as it is, may 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


177 


be duplicated to-morrow, and witli variations ; and the next 
day you will have it in triplicate, with a complete change of 
characters, still more melancholy, and perhaps every one of 
them fictitious.” 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

They visit the public Galleries , and on their way see some- 
thing more of the dark side of the Great Metropolis. 

The schoolmaster makes a favorable impression ■ 
on Philetus , their new acquaintance. 

The next day, Alethi accompanied Pliiloscommon to the 
great library. The reading rooms, badly ventilated, were so 
crowded that, after two uncomfortable hours, Alethi was 
obliged reluctantly to interrupt the schoolmaster, who as 
usual was up to his ears in his researches, and was besides 
not so nicely organized as his companion. 

“ Don’t stir, Philos',” he whispered; “ I can find my way 
alone. But really it is too much for me in this place.” 

“ Yes, they have not so many books here as in Monachopo- 
lis, but they have many more readers. Though I have not 
your nose, — I wish I had ” — ( here the little man looked 
facetious — perhaps to prevent Aletlii’s feeling so, perhaps 
to give him an excuse for smiling — ) “ I can see that if 
the laborers here do not eat their bread in the sweat of their 
brows they do it in the pallor of their faces. You are white 
as a sheet. Let us hurry out.” 

Instead of returning by the way they had come, they 
took a street which led them, by a not very reputable part 
of the town, directly to the great square where is the public 
picture-gallery, which Philos' proposed that they should 
visit. They had just crossed a wider street when they heard 
8 * 


178 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


a man's voice cry out profanely, “ What has G — Almighty 
sent us now ? ” With a shock, Alethi looked round involun- 
tarily, supposing the exclamation was meant for his com- 
panion. But he saw it was directed against a woman, who, 
bareheaded, was passing' over into the wider street. Her 
flimsy gown, trimmed over with a quantity of new ribbons 
of the most positive and opposite colors, her naked shoulders 
and her painted cheeks, spoke unmistakably her condition. 
“ We saw nothing of this kind in Lutetia,” said Alethi. 

“ That is not because it does not exist there,” replied 
Philos'. “ It is one of the graces of that capital that certain 
vices do not there obtrude themselves, as it is one of the dis- 
graces of this that here they do.” 

“ That is because the liberty of the subject is more sacred 
here. You would not have a woman debarred from the 
privilege of making herself a laughing-stock, if she chose ? ” 
“ No. if that were all ; nor a man either. But if the spec- 
tacle were likely to demoralize, I think I would. The ex- 
istence of this class of women and its continuance is often 
called ‘ the social evil’ ; but it is not. Society has nothing 
to do with it, further than to multiply it, as it does itself. 
The oldest record of pastoral life is adorned with the indi- 
vidual portrait of a strong-minded and free-hearted woman, 
qiKB in propatulo ad viam prostitit ; the prototype of the im- 
perial dame, who, 

‘ Nigrum flavo crinem abscondente galero, 

Intravit calidum yeteri centone lupanar, 

Et cellam vacuam atque suam, tunc nuda papillis 
Prostitit auratis, titulnm mentita Lyciscae.’ 

But as no law and no regulation of social order can sup- 
press the evil, the next best thing is to keep it, so far as may 
be, hidden. In Lutetia a man must seek the Thamar, here 
she will confront you in the highways, and if you have your 
sister on your arm her insolent gaze will make you tremble 
for the thoughts of the heart you would keep ignorant of 


ALETHITHEEAS. 


179 




O F 

such pollution. — But now look ther.e,” continued tlie 
schoolmaster. 

They were approaching a butcher’s shop. On a broad 
shelf which extended in front of the shopwindow there was 
a row of little piles of meat, in pieces from two to three 
inches square fixed one over another in a pyramidal shape 
on wooden skewers. All were disgustingly black. A poor 
but decent-looking woman was on the pavement before the 
shelf, testing the greater or less offensiveness of the tainted 
morsels by lifting the little piles, one after another, to her 
nose. She did it with a kind of dread, and her face ex- 
pressed a certain degree of dislike, if not of abhorrence. 

Alethi, who would gladly have bought good meat for her, 
but durst not offer because she was plainly not a mendicant, 
was greatly shocked. 

“ I knew you would be,” said Philoscommon, responding 
to his look; “and in fact one object in bringing you through 
this street was that you might see this sight, which has sick- 
ened me almost every day.” 

“But are there no laws to forbid the sale of such poison?” 

“ Yes, as in other places. The penalty for selling diseased 
or unwholesome meat is something considerable ; but, as in 
other places, the law is easily and is constantly evaded. The 
meat has been good ; it is only kept too long ; and the poor 
have not the means to pay for fresher.” 

“ It is horrible ! ” exclaimed Alethi. 

“ What ? this special case of misery ? ” 

“ Not this alone, but as one of many which I have every- 
where observed, and which make me feel that there is too 
great a contrast in the conditions of men. When I see the 
utterly hopeless condition to which thousands are bom, who 
know no joy, not even in childhood, — so that, while in one 
street there is the constant ring of pleasant voices, the happy 
laughter of childhood, the graceful sport of girls and the 
jocund games of boys, in another but a little way off there 


180 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


is no echo but that of discordant cries of vulgar trade, soul- 
debasing and thought-contracting, or the odious sound of 
blasphemies and ribaldry that make the heart shudder, I 
confess to you that I am tempted to doubt a direct Provi- 
dence.” 

“And yet you have not seen one half that I have. Go 
down with me into the coal-mines, — and what then ? Do 
you remember the print that so pained you in the illustrated 
journal in Micromereia ? ” 

“ Of the young Philautian girls on their hands and knees, 
harnessed like goats, and drawing up the slopes of the mines 
the dirt of the horses which they had there gathered ? ” 

“ Yes. That is but one picture of dozens as painful that 
might be made of almost every mode of life among the hard- 
working classes of this dominion, where the poor are kept 
so, and degradation is more degraded, that the rich and easy 
may enjoy their luxuries and their comforts unstinted and 
undivided. And this state is irremediable. What if labor 
stand out for better wages, the craving of the bowels soon 
compels it to give in. But this is not the worst feature. 
You may look with sadness on the immature girl stooping 
over her daily task in the unwholesome factory, you see her 
body crippled and you know her mind is stunted as her 
frame ; but within a few miles of this metropolis the peas- 
antry are crowded together in their cots or huts like pigs in 
sties, the distinction of sex scarce known, and squalor and 
misery, brutish ignorance and shameless immorality, are uni- 
versal and perpetual. They are human, yet they live like 
beasts ; they are God’s creatures, but they never know happi- 
ness. Pleasures they have, but they are transient and in 
their nature degrading ; and their most fortunate moment is 
that which releases them from a life which from their un- 
cradled and rag-clad infancy has been one of constant care 
and all but constant suffering.” 

“You draw this picture, and you never color falsely. 


OP ALETIIITHERAS. 


181 


Wliat then are your thoughts ? Do you too doubt at 
times.” 

“ What can I say ? All I know, Alethi, is the world seems 
devilish bad, and it requires all one’s faith, and, if you will 
understand me, all one’s egotism, to believe that it is cared 
for.” 

With the Gallery our traveler was well pleased, though he 
thought with his companion that the term of National as 
applied to it was not the most appropriate, seeing that in 
the whole collection was but one picture painted by a native 
modem artist, — who, by the by, had bequeathed it on con- 
dition that it should hang side by side with one of the best 
of the greatest of landscape-painters, thus challenging a com- 
parison, which was rendered more easy by the barbarous 
rashness that had subjected the latter to the hands of the 
cleaner. After lingering over and returning to several noble 
works, not forgetting the incomparable Eros who is taking 
his lesson from a Hermes less unmatchable, they proceeded 
to another collection. Here in the Hall, while they stood in 
unqualified admiration before the group of Hylas and the 
Naiads, who should enter but Philetus, the gentleman whose 
acquaintance they had made in the Park. 

“ I find you well employed,” he said. “ I wish that I 
could see my countrymen as appreciative.” 

“ Perhaps they are so familiar with its beauties,” remarked 
Alethi, “ that it is not just to complain of their neglect. To 
foreigners these marbles are a novelty.” 

“ What you say is just, so far as it applies to the present- 
fervor of your admiration. But what is the reason that all 
that is so admirable, not merely in the conception, the de- 
sign, the composition, and the expression, but in the mechan- 
ical manipulation of this work, does not draw at least the 
same number of beholders as the many works of less merit 
which do ? I fear because it is native and is not old. If it 
had been dug up in some ancient? city - 

;<j& 


182 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ It would have been less clean, but not more venerable,” 
said Philoscommon. “ Do you find that they discriminate 
better in the sister art ? Let us go in. Ah, here is inven- 
tion ! What novel ever told the story of a life, with more 
pathos, with more humor, with more strength, and yet with 
more fidelity of detail, than does this series ? It is by one 
of your most famous painters. Is he, do you think, more 
attractive than the sculptor ? ” 

“ I am afraid that you are right,” said Philetus. “ This 
painter is immortal, and his genius has been made familiar 
through his own reduplication, by engraving, of his works, 
but the multitude have no real relish or aptitude for enjoy- 
ment of them. They turn, as you see them now, to those 
madder-tinted water-nymphs and those white-lead Cupids, 
which together have gathered about their unflesh-like nudi- 
ties the only five persons in the room beside ourselves.” 

“ But to murmur at this w T ant of appreciation, is it not to 
complain that all minds are not of a high order and all 
tastes are not carefully cultivated ? While the masses of men 
do not rise above the level which makes them common, how 
are w T e to expect among them the perspicacity which is only 
enjoyed by those who stand more high?” Philetus was 
silent, as if he could not answer, and Philoscommon to Ale- 
thi’s satisfaction thus continued : “ Or do you believe that 
the painter and the sculptor really "work for them ? He has 
it is true their admiration in his eye, — for, after all, popu- 
larity is something worth the winning, — but does he lay 
himself out in his best efforts for them ; or is it w T ith the 
thought that he shall satisfy the few ? The poet works upon 
the same principle ; he hopes for popularity, he labors always 
with that end in view; but does he study to satisfy the 
masses ? or is his aim directed through the very excellencies 
through which he can hope to win the approbation of the 


wise and well-informed alpne ?” 
Philetus’ faeccTad becoiiie mi 


much flushed as Philosconimon 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


183 


drew this last exemplification ; but, when the schoolmaster 
had ceased, he merely said : “I find that you are right. We 
all covet the approval of the many, — for without it there is 
no fame ; but the best of us hope to attain it while following 
our own predilections or obeying what we consider fixed 
principles in art, and thus sometimes lose it. Is it not strange 
that w r e should cherish truly the opinion of the few alone, 
yet hanker with a ravenous appetite for the weightless and 
unweighed bravos of the many ? ” 

“ Not at all,” said Philoscommon ; “ it was so designed. 
The world is not all venison and plum-pudding. We better 
love the concentrated and high-flavored food, but we take but 
little of it on our platter, while we cram our entrails with 
the less savory and more unsubstantial. The brain and 
stomach are of kindred elements, and both work to one pur- 
pose in the alchemy of the Almighty.” 

Pliiletus looked at the quizzical visage of the schoolmaster 
as if in doubt whether he ought not to show disgust at this 
homely metaphor, but broke into a light and pleasant laugh, 
and said, extending his hand to Philoscommon, “We must 
know each other better.” 

“ You have promised that already to one of us,” said the 
philosopher without hesitation ; “ but you make no haste to 
come.” 

Pliiletus colored, then looked very sad. “ If you knew ” 

he began. “ No matter. You will excuse me,” he said, 

turning to Alethi. Then giving a hand to each, “ To-night, 
if you please, I will really be with you.” 


184 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

Our travelers are visited by Philetus , and become engaged in 
discussing the rights of strong nations and the 
wrongs of weak. 

That evening the travelers were discussing the recent war 
with Sursia. They agreed so well in their opinions, that 
nothing novel was elicited to either. So the schoolmaster 
observed, “ It would not be easy to make fire from the col- 
lision of two flints. Let us wait the arrival of Philetus, who 
may serve us as the steel.” 

“ But he is a Philautian,” said Aletlii. “ Our sentiments 
would hardly please him.” 

“We need not obtrude them on him. They satisfy our- 
selves. What we want is to bring out his own. And I have 
that opinion of our new friend, Philautian though he is, that 
I am sure he will give them candidly.” 

“ I am glad you think so highly of him. I was afraid, 
Philos', you ranked him with the rest of his countrymen.” 

“ No, he is really what they seem. Philetus is one of those 
exceptions to the general character of this people, that are 
so noble and so lovely that one is almost reconciled for their 
sake with all the rest. If we wrong his country, be sure he 
will resent it, — perhaps intemperately ; but in his passion 
for the truth he will admit everything against her, so the ac- 
cusation be but just, an(l probably will be carried forward by 
his temperament to say himself what we should not presume 


OF ALETHITHER AS. 


183 


to say, and to reveal what from our knowledge we should 
not discover to be quite so base.” 

u There is a knock now. Tell me quickly, what do you 
take him for, Philos 7 ? I mean in position, or pursuit.” 

“ For a poet, or other author. He implied as much. And 
probably an unsuccessful one.” 

Philetus entered. After the first ceremonies and then fa- 
miliar talk, Philoscommon said: “We were speaking, just 
before you came in, of the successful war your nation in al- 
liance with its old enemy had waged against Sursia in de- 
fence of the Osmans.” 

“Not the nation,” said Philetus with energy, “but the 
government, which, I thank God, is a very different thing, 
though its policy too often warps the natural sentiments of 
the people, and through their self-love, and that pride of 
self which is love of country or helps to form love of coun- 
try, drives them into wars of ambition whose glory puffs 
their hearts but shrivels frightfully their pockets.” 

“ But this was not a war of such a nature, but one of hu- 
manity, of” 

“ Of humanity ? ” cried the Pliilautian, interrupting Phil- 
joscommon with something like indignation, then looking 
sharply at him. “ Do you believe that ? you ? You don’t 
look it.” 

“ My looks are rather peculiar. You must n’t mind them,” 
said Philoscommon drily. — “I but repeated what I hear. 
You make pretence of such ; and not a journal have I seen 
of all your press that has not lauded to the skies the gener- 
osity, the self-sacrifice, the magnanimous disinterestedness 
and the expansive philanthropy, displayed by Philautia in 
this and other wars, all of which are undertaken in the in- 
terests of humanity, and waged ” 

— “ For her own. You either banter me,” said Philetus, 
“ or you try to sound my sentiments. Very well, you shall 
have them, — though I see in your eyes they will but reflect 


18G 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


your own and those of every other intelligent and well-in- 
structed foreigner. Of all governments, the government of 
Philautia is the most hypocritical, double-dealing, time- 
serving, and remorselessly selfish. Our enemies, and some- 
times our friends when we have wronged them, call us per- 
fidious. And we are, — that is, our government. We have 
simulated friendship for Alectoreion ( though there we are 
fully reciprocated ) and have shown real indifference to lib- 
erty when it suited our interest to make friendship with its 
enemies. Is Alazoneia in our way, then the revolutionists in 
Anastasia are to be encouraged ; need we an alliance with 
Alazoneia to counterpoise the anticipated fraternization of 
Alectoreion and Sursia, then the liberty of Anastasia is to be 
sacrificed, ParthenopS ceases to be misgoverned, and Ichnusa 
is recommended to keep cool. As for this war you speak of, 
there never was a more turn-coat policy than that which has 
thus culminated. Now seemingly on the side of Sursia, then 
acting against her, our government showed through its em- 
bassy neither candor, nor honor ; and when the game was 
up, what need was there to proclaim to the nations that. the 
resort to arms was in behalf of the enfeebled Power which 
had so little claim to represent humanity ? Could we not 
have said, ‘ Sursia would find her way to the Internal Sea. 
The possession of the capital of the Osmans would give her 
that, and make her through her great resources its mistress. 
This for us ( not to speak of the danger to our Eastern pos- 
sessions, to which the Osmans form a partial bulwark ) is 
vital, and for Alectoreion and for other Powers is a danger 
too. We must stop the strides of this colossus; and we 
will.’ This, sir, had been honest ; and, unless I give men 
credit for more sense than they possess, would have been 
wise.” 

“ Honesty being, you think, the best policy. How is it 
then that nations, like individuals, rarely practice it ? ” 

“ Because individuals are so devilish tricky that nations 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


187 


represent but the aggregate of roguery. Look at what we 
are doing in Serica. Alectoreion and Philautia, both with- 
out declaration of war, and without any formal alliance 
together for the purpose, combining to attack one of her 
capitals ; each too without any other really sufficient pretext 
than that which power and self-interest can furnish.” 

“ And what other would you have 2 ” said Philoscommon. 
“ It seems to me that one would be enough, yet you have 
mentioned two.” 

“You speak ironically,” said Philetus, with surprise. 

“ No, after the fashion of the world. It is true, his five- 
clawed-dragon Majesty, the Hoan-Ti, had a right to have a 
Summer Palace. Your sovereign has two. But what right 
had he to prohibit foreigners from looking at it ? So you 
Philautians and your new friends, in the exercise of power, 
burnt it down to teach him civilization, and let your soldiers 
carry off all its contents to elucidate self-interest.” 

“ You mistake,” said Philetus ; “ that ^as not the cause. 
Two Philautians had been made way with, somehow or 
other, by the barbarians.” 

“ And do they never disappear among the Alectryons or 
other Jesousian nations ? Yet you do not bum down palaces 
and rob them of their treasures, by way of retribution.” 

“You are right,” said Philetus. “This aggressiveness of 
my country, this eagerness to exercise its power on the most 
frivolous pretexts against weaker nations, and with a promp- 
titude that shuts out from them the chances of compunction 
even had they erred, affects me with a kind of moral sick- 
ness. It is but recently Philautia destroyed by bombard- 
ment, with frightful loss of lives to the crowded population, 
a miserable wooden town in the kingdom of Nifon, that was 
perfectly innocent of all wrong but that of belonging to a 
country whose policy it is to choose to have nothing to do 
with us.” 

“ Nihil non arrogat armis ,” quoth the schoolmaster. 


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“ Yes, — as one of our foremost poets hath it, — 

* of those brave sons the mother, 

Who butcher’d half the world, and bullied t’ other ! ” 

“ Is n’t it so everywhere ? ” said Philoscommon. “ Would 
you trust the lizard if it had the size of the crocodile, or 
the cat if endowed with the strength of the tiger ? ” 

Philetus looked at him a moment, as if measuring his ca- 
pacious head. “It is so,” he said. “ But it is not the less, 
painful to realize. Do you know that our popular assembly, 
or what should be our popular assembly, — for, as Lucidus 
lately said, ‘ the great body of the people, five million men, 
are totally and purposely excluded from any share in the 
government,’ — do you know that a very large proportion, if 
not the largest relatively, of its members are military men ? 
Hence we have Capreolus Dorcas, though not himself the 
wearer of a sabre, cry out in fury for the extermination of 
the brave savages in that remote island of the Southern Seas 
which we trespassed upon and, through ' the clemency and 
simplicity and, shame to us ! the unsuspecting honesty of the 
innocent people, obtained a footing in, or invoke ferociously 
the horrors of a new war, though that last with Sursia cost us, 
over and above its more than twenty-two thousand lives, up- 
wards of a hundred millions of our money. He did so, 
though the war he shouted to provoke would have been one 
of special wickedness, of injustice so abominable that it 
must have been utterly God-condemned, and would have 
taxed the already over-burdened resources of the country as 
they never before were taxed, and Capreolus was applauded 
to the echo by the fools with epaulets who vote away the 
money of a trading people.” 

“ If they were fools in cassocks,” said Philosc, “ you would 
have them squandering it in foreign missions.” 

Philetus’ eyes flashed, and his bold nose wrinkled up and 
swelled out at the nostrils. “ Those missions ! ” he exclaim- 
ed. “ To teach to the heathen, who cannot comprehend the 


OP ALET HITHER AS. 


189 


simplest proposition in ethics, the mystery of a triune god- 
head and the incomprehensibility of an angelical incarna- 
tion, while here we have at home, in country and city, 
myriads of the wretched to whom it would be a mercy as it 
is a duty to teach them anything ! ” 

“ If you accompanied the doctrine or the discipline with 
plenty to eat and drink.” 

“ True again,” said Philetus. “ You should have been 
born a Philautian.” 

“Thank you,” replied the schoolmaster : “ such as you de- 
scribe your country, I had as lief belong where I do, to 
Medamou.” 

Philetus turned to Alethi. “ What a blessing you have in 
that friend of yours,” he said with a sigh. 

“ He certainly keeps me amused,” replied Alethi, smiling. 

“ Do you know,” continued Philetus, after gazing at the 
queer animal with a melancholy look, “ that I have a great 
mind to introduce you to a friend of mine. I am reminded 
of her by this gentleman. Not that they look at all 
alike,” he said smiling, then turning very red ; “ but there 

is something I mean I always think of her when I see 

him.” 

“She must be devilish ugly,” said Philoscommon in a 
whisper which he thought would not be heard by Philetus, as 
the latter was looking down, being lost in revery. 

“ No, she is not,” said the Philautian without displeasure. 

“ She has a beautiful face. But she is ” He paused in 

embarrassment. 

“Never mind ra<?,” said the sage. “ She is deformed.” 

Philetus stared at him, and turned again very red. “ How 
should you know ? ” 

“I judge so, from your own language. Now don’t look 
confused: I know my bad points, and admit them — be- 
cause I cannot help them. I long to see your friend.” 

“ You shall,” said Philetus, “ some day — soon.” 


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TSAYELS BY SEA AND LAND 


After this moment he became sacl and abstracted, and very 
soon took his leave. 

“ That man,” said Philoscommon, “ is in love, and with a 
girl deformed.” 

Alethitheras did not answer, but seemed to be absorbed in 
thoughts of his own. Presently he observed : 

“ I wish you would resolve a doubt for me which the con- 
versation of that amiable and manly Philautian has suggested. 
Has one nation, however high may be its standing in the 
world, the right to force another, though this latter may be 
greatly lower in the scale of civilization, into association 
with itself? ” 

“ That is easily answered,” replied Philos'. “ Suppose you 
had a neighbor who chose to resist all your importunities for 
a friendly intercourse. Would you have a right to compel 
him to the interchange ? ” 

‘‘ Hardly.” 

“Well, as with individuals, so it is with states. There is 
no law of nature, of morals, or of human society, that can 
prohibit a nation which chooses to remain isolated, from fol- 
lowing its own policy. But whether it has the power to do 
so, in the face of opposition, that is another question.” 

“ It is merely then the so-called right of the strongest that 
assumes the color of a regard for the interests of humanity.” 

“ Purely so. Had it not been found convenient or advan- 
tageous to disturb her, Serica might have made her teapots 
after her own fashion, and worshiped her pot-bellied gods 
without Jesousian supervision, till the world’s end. Philau- 
tia never wants a pretext for quarrel, and where no ground 
of offense can be made to exist in the habits of a people 
themselves, she contrives to find some cause to provoke them ^ 
to animosity, which she then lays hold of as an outrage and 
resents till she is satisfied.” 

Aletlii was silent, as if he wished him to continue ; and the 
philosopher proceeded : — 


« 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


191 


“Yet condemn as we will and must these aggressive and 
rapacious acts, there can be no question that the result will 
tend largely to the general advantage. Thus Providence con- 
verts even evil into good.” 

“ Then you would make Providence to sanction evil.” 

“ Not at all,” said Philoscommon gravely. “ If you set 
fire to an old house of which every part and all the contents 
are amply insured, and there result from the conflagration no 
loss of life nor even slight physical injury, the result may be 
advantageous everyway except to the insuring company or 
companies, whose loss, being divided among numerous stock- 
holders and being more than counterbalanced by their daily 
gains, is scarcely to be computed. A finer and more solid 
house is built ‘ with all the modern improvements,’ the street 
is bettered thereby, and the site rendered more valuable, 
while the inconvenience of those obliged to shift suddenly 
to a new home- is not only temporary but may even bring 
them to better accommodations, as well as furnish them with 
newer household goods. Here is a good result from an evil 
cause ; but the cause remains still evil, nor is your criminal- 
ity diminished in even the slightest degree. Do you see 
that?” 

“Yes.” 

“ Well, when a strong, a well-governed, a moral, an intel- 
ligent people like the Philautians, sweep from the earth a 
weaker and an abject race, they do a service to humanity, 
but it is by evil means, nor can the aggression be admitted 
to any justification ; and when you read of railways already 
laid in Serigal, you cannot doubt the good result to the 
world at large of the eventual absorption of Maurusia. Yet 
the Alectryons are guilty as are the Philautians. In other 
words, the laws set on nature by the Deity are such that, as 
in the physical world great and good results may arise from 
violent disturbing causes, so in the moral; and the earth- 
quake wdiich swallows up a province on terra-firma throws 


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up from the bottom of the sea an island, that more than re- 
places it in extent as the future habitation of men, and per- 
haps has every other physical advantage, of soil, of mineral 
treasures, and of situation. God from the unseen Infinite 
looks calmly over all the changes of this atom of His will, 
and sees in the very rottenness of human moral corruption 
the seeds of moral goodness and grandeur germinating, and, 
while commiserating the temporary affliction of his creatures, 
anticipates with tranquil satisfaction the change that shall 
overgrow its vestiges.” 

“ But how can the Deity pity, yet bear patiently ?” 

“ That which in the ordinance of nature is inevitable ? It 
seems to me, with the awful yet beneficent calm of Infinite 
Wisdom. It is but our eyes, Alethitheras, that see the suffer- 
ing in such colors that we overrate it. If ten thousand men 
are butchered on a field of battle, we think but of the wounds, 
the blood, the agony, and shudder. Do we ever say to our- 
selves that the wearisome suffering of a lingering death-sick- 
ness is far worse ? do we stop to consider that the agony of 
many deathbeds that are said to be in the course of nature 
outdoes all that cannon-shot and sword and even fire can 
occasion ? I have seen myself a strong woman tear her hair 
in such frenzy of agony that I ran out of the room unable to 
endure it ; and she lingered in this torture, on a natural sick- 
bed, for more than six hours. If whole villages are laid 
desolate, and families beg their bread in abject misery, one 
conflagration in a populous town will do as much, and 
thousands are daily, in all great cities, without a morsel of 
bread to eat or a bundle of straw to lie on, and know not 
where they shall find either for the morrow.” 

“You make me shudder.” 

“Were the picture false, I should make you laugh. It is 
too real. Let us but bow our heads in submission and say 
with the Salaman, 1 God is great.’ ” . 

Alethi looked with wonder at the philosopher. All 


OP ALETHITHEKAS. 


198 


his mirthfulness was gone, and his ludicrous physiognomy 
had become lighted up by his imagination to a radiance that 
was almost beauty. The next minute the schoolmaster, who 
was gazing on vacancy, turned about, and seeing the expres- 
sion in Alethi’s eyes, resumed at once his ordinary manner, 
and even somewhat of his occasional buffoonery. 

“You are again thinking,” he said, “ of Socrates, who was 
almost such an ape as I am. I suppose he may have looked 
at times so enlightened as to wake just such a stare in his 
disciples’ eyes as I see in yours. But, if I yield to him in 
wisdom, I am more than his match in ugliness.” The nose 
swayed to and fro, and shriveled up, and smoothed itself 
down, and the eyes twinkled funnily ; and their owner, cut- 
ting a single boyish caper with his spindle legs, finished the 
destruction of his own edifice. 

His companion looked at him with more wonder, but with 
anything but admiration ; but in his heart he forgot not his 
words, and pondered them often when alone. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

They go to the playhouse, where they see a famous novel- 
writer. Pliiletus indulges in a criticism on a never - 
to-be-criticized dramatic genius. 

The next day, Pliiletus came early, to engage them to go 
to the theatre. 

“You know of course,” he said (addressing both gentle- 
men ) “the worldwide reputation of our great poet. Per- 
haps,” ( but turning to Philosc, ) “ you are familiar with hi3 
works.” 

“ Sufficiently so,” said Pliiloscommon ; “ I believe, both of 
us.” 

D 


194 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ Philosc is, at all events,” said Alethi. 

“ I am glad of that, and supposed it. 1 cannot promise 
you much to-night in the principal performers, except per- 
haps the female one. She is rather eminent. But you will 
at least see how we manage these things in Chaunopolis, and 
I believe that that will be a treat for you.” 

“ It certainly will,” said Philoscommon, “ and something 
of a novelty for one of us; for we have no playhouse in 
Medamou.” 

The audience was large, drawn by the celebrity of the fe- 
male protagonist, whose proper sphere however was in com- 
edy, wherein she really excelled, and not the serious part she 
now assumed. The play told the story of a criminal and 
fatal ambition. A man, in the plenitude of' honors achieved 
by success in war, murders in his own castle his royal guest 
and benefactor, and usurping the throne endeavors to estab- 
lish himself thereon by a succession of murders. 

The curtain dropped upon the first act. Alethi was asked 
if he was pleased. 

“At first,” he said, “quite the contrary. The Soldier 
talked fustian, and his language besides was unseemly in 
that presence.” He looked at the schoolmaster, as if for his 
opinion. 

“ You are right,” said Philoscommon. “ As a whole too 
it was unnatural, and not the unpremeditated recital of a 
participator in the action. Well ? ” 

“ The scenes increase in interest. Much of the language 
struck me as nervous and masculine, and often stately in the 
highest degree, and in its fullest power so admirable that I 
cannot imagine anything beyond it, but too frequently again 
marred by unnatural conceits, insipid verbal quibbles, and 
bombast.” 

“ They are everywhere faults of the poet,” said Philetus, 
“ and vitiate even his finest passages. But wdiat have you 
to say of the plot, so far as it is yet developed ? ” 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


195 


“ It seems to me too precipitate, the resolution to murder. 
There is something of consideration wanted between the 
prediction of the witches and the suggestions of the wife.” 

“ That is want of time,” said Philetus smiling. “ Our 
poets never regard it. They ’ll. make a fortnight pass be- 
tween two Scenes, and a dozen years will be gathered in the 
space from Act to Act. The imagination of the spectator is 
expected to leap the interval.” 

“ That can only be done,” said Alethi, “ where the play 
has been previously well-read.” 

“And what think you of the actors? Of course I mean 
the principal ones.” 

“ They seem to me to mouth, their step is not a walk, but 
a stride or strut, and, like the poet himself, they too often 
aim rather to make a point with the audience than to obey 
the indications, of their part.” 

“ That is the custom of the stage,” said Philetus, again 
smiling. “ To speak and step and look like persons in real 
life would be thought tame. But we will talk of this further 
when the play is over. Now you have just a moment to take 
note of one of our celebrities. Do you see that rather young 
man in the front row of the second box from the stage on 
your left ? the one with thick and somewhat long brown 
hair, full sensuous lips, and a pleasant twinkle in his well- 
shaped blue eyes that indicates with shrewdness selfsatis- 
faction, and a knowledge that the world thinks he has a 
right to it. That is Daisies, who first made his mark under 
the pen-name of Fuzbuz. He is our most popular writer of 
fiction, though he carried it rather too far when, returning 
from Yesputia where the republicans had made a god of 
him, he catered to the envy, jealousy and prejudices of his 
own countrymen by ignoring the many things that are great 
and good among that people, and exaggerating everything 
that was bad or ludicrous, or which from its want of conso- 
sance with our habits was sure to be to us distasteful. Yet 


196 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


here, at liome, for one stain and one sore that he there found, 
he knew there were, in the body social and political, a thou- 
sand, monstrous in spread and gangrenous in nature, — else 
are the pictures which have made him famous all a carica- 
ture and lie. And indeed such a pencil suits him best ; for, 
with all his real talent, he is chiefly popular by reason of 
certain characters which he makes conspicuous by peculiar 
phrases and peculiar fashions that are repeated and obtruded 
on all occasions. Now, we know that a man with such a 
monotony of absurdity and such grotesqueness of mannerism 
would very soon be cured of his tomfoolery or moral idio- 
syncracy by the jeers of society, or of the street, or else 
would find his way into a lunatic-asylum. But the great 
public, which cannot otherwise discriminate, is happy to 
find a point by which it knows the character as often as it 
reappears, and, pleased with its own discernment, awards 
to the designer the credit of having drawn the character 
to life. 1 It is so natural ! ’ they say. Yet the fools know 
nothing of nature, never did know, and never will know — 
through Fuzbuz. But there goes up the curtain.” 

After the tragedy there was a farce, — u A time-honored 
observance,” said Pliiletus, “ which, if I were a tragic dram- 
atist, I would not allow to mar the impression made by my 
catastrophe. Will you stay ? It is more popular to do so, 
than well-bred.” 

“ O let us stay by all means — unless you are tired or in 
haste,” said Alethi. 

So they sat it out, and were well satisfied. Alethi, on 
being asked, pronounced the acting better there than in the 
previous piece. 

“ It is so,” said Philetus ; “ and for two reasons. In the 
first place, it is easier to find good actors of farce than of 
tragedy ; in the second place, an exaggeration of their part 
— if it be on the humorous side — tends rather to enhance 
the frolic or gaiety of the piece.” 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


197 


“ It is for the same reason, I suppose,” added Philoscom- 
mon, “that it is very much easier to find a good writer of 
humorous drama, or eyen of the drama of manners, than of 
the serious and tragic. For one who writes in the latter 
naturally, there are one hundred who are stilted, declamatory, 
and otherwise unnatural ; nor are the best, as we have seen 
to-night, always exempt from a like censure.” 

They took their way to sup together. As they walked, 
Philetus said, “ You have now seen an entire play of our 
great poet. What think you of him ? ” 

“ Facile princeps ,” answered the schoolmaster, to whom the 
question seemed to be directed. “ But” He paused. 

“Not exactly a model,” said Philetus, supplying the 
break. In the partial light of the street they could not see 
if he smiled ; but his voice gave them the impression that he 
did. As he appeared to wait forPhiloscommon to continue, 
the latter said : 

“You are more competent than we are to give an opinion; 
and, as you are a Philautian, we would rather hear you.” 

“ It is perhaps for that reason that I should not,” he return- 
ed, now unmistakably smiling. “ But as you are foreigners 
you will not perhaps accuse me of envy, as might my own 
countrymen. One of our best modern poets who himself 
wrote dramas, but not very good ones, is reported to have 
said that he feared to criticize this great author lest he should 
be suspected ; and there are men, who claim to be critics, 
who actually become furious at the mere idea of one’s ques- 
tioning his completeness.” 

“ I see how it is,” said Philoscommon. “ You have made 
of him a god and of his writings a religion. He who does 
not believe in them is damned.” 

“ To the very lowest abyss of literary ineptitude.” 

“ Such fanaticism,” continued the schoolmaster, “ is to me 
a proof that the religion is a false one. If the votaries 
themselves were sure of his divinity, they would not be so 


198 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


clamorous against those who find fault with an image, the 
magnificence of which is overlaid with tinsel and whose 
members have visibly wooden and distorted feet.” 

“ It is well said,” returned Philetus. — “I wish you would 
continue for us, returning to the criticism of that single 
tragedy where your friend left off.” 

“ No,” said Philoscommon ; “ if nothing else were in your 
favor, but I were all you are pleased to intimate, you natur- 
ally have a better recollection of the piece. So pray go on ; 
and as a compromise . to save your modesty I will throw in, 
as occasion serves, a few judicial comments.” 

“If you knew him as I do,” said Alethi, “you would be- 
lieve they will not be few.” 

“ Ah my Telemachus, is that the way you punish my mo- 
nitions ? Mind him not, Philetus; I shall be all ear.” 

“But not the less my Mentor,” said Philetus. “Well 
then. We are at the final Scene of Act I. Fancy a man 
about to commit an unusually atrocious murder, and one 
which involved such doubtful issues for himself, beating his 
brains to quibble on a word, especially in a colloquy with 
himself ! 

‘ If it were done, when ’tis done, then ’twere well 
It were done quickly ! ’ 

This sounds well to the faithful in Doryp'alos, who do not 
question his divinity ; and as it is followed by the stately 
language in which the poet is often so truly great, as he is 
usually in his serious parts magnificent, 

* If the assassination 

Could trammel up the consequence, and catch, 

With his surcease, success ’ 

admiration does not stop to ask if this is natural, if indeed 
a man, in the mood the meditating regicide must be in, 
would use such language in the calculating arguments and 
impulsive fancies of his own mind. In the midst of the 
soliloquy, he falls to moralize, and well, as the poet almost 
always does, but somewhat out of place, as in general, in 


OF ALETHITDEKAS. 


199 


such sentiments, he is absolutely so, and then he draws the 
case of his atrocity, reasoning well and painting naturally 
though vigorously. But who would expect that the pomp- 
ous close of this fine passage, 

’ -* Besides, this Cannud 

Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against 
The deep damnation of his taking-off,’ 

would usher in such arrant fustian as this ? 

* And pity, like a naked new-born babe 
Striding the blast, or Heaven’s cherubim, hors’d 
Upon the sightless couriers of the air, 

Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye, 

That tears shall drown the wind.’ 

As his angels had put him in mind of the cherubim, and his 
trumpets make astraddle Pity blow, so the blind coursers fur- 
nish him a saddle, and the pensive murderer elaborates such 
an idea as this : 

‘ I have no spur 

To prick the sides of my intent, but only 
Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself 
And falls on the other.’ ” 

“As the crime was in meditation, and if he were sure of 
failure he would not attempt it,” said Philoscommon, “it 
seems to me that the passage' errs in another respect besides 
the want of judgment and good-taste.” 

“ The sentiment,” returned Philetus, “is probably a general 
reflection, and not anticipative. But even then it is faulty, 
as this was no time for cogitations of the sort, any more than 
for swollen language and elaborated metaphor. Similar ob- 
jections may be raised to the conclusion of the famous apos- 
trophe in the next Act, — which, by the by, is all too sudden 
after the apostrophizer’s communication with other persons, 
and had come in more aptly by itself like most soliloquies : 

— ‘Now o’er the one half world 
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse 
The curtain’d sleep.’ — 


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This were well, did it there stop. But when the speaker 
goes on to say, 

— ‘Now witchcraft celebrates 
Pale Hecate’s offerings,’ — 

he shows that he has deliberation. In his own quibbling 
phrase, ‘ Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.’ 
And to continue with 

— * And wither’d Murder, 

Alarnm’d by his sentinel the wolf, 

Whose howl ’s his watch, thus with his stealthy pace, 

With Tarquin’s ravishing strides, towards his design 
Moves like a ghost,’ 

is to stoop to those miserable conceits which degrade this 
great poet and to make the character disappear in the author, 
who, unsympathizing, writes in fustian with cold blood. 

“ In the next Scene we are full of admiration ; but, in the 
very midst of its excellence, we must have 

‘ Methought I heard a voice cry, Sleep no more ! 

Camtheb does murder sleep, the innocent sleep, 

Sleep that knits up the ravel’d sleave of care, 

The death of each day’s life, sore labor’s bath, 

Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course, 

Chief nourisher in life’s feast ; ’ 

which is about as wretched a specimen of labored conceits 
and frigid amplification as we have perhaps in any of Doryp- 
alos’s great dramas. 

“ Let me see : what comes next ? O, the Porter. Shall I 
go on ? ” 

“ Can you ask ? ” 

“ The Porter in the next Scene is one of those defects of 
taste which, characteristic of his time, and especially of this 
poet, are what has after all helped to make his popularity. 
The vulgar mind that would weary of the sombreness of 
unrelieved tragedy relishes these stupid jests, and the igno- 
rant that has no real appreciation of nature finds here what 
he understands as such, and rejoices, though it is dragged in 
by the heels.” 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


201 


“ And is moreover grossly improbable and unnatural. I 
recollect the passage,” said Philoscommon, “ though they 
omitted it in the representation, perhaps solely for its inde- 
cency. We read it over together, with the rest of the play, 
this morning, and Alethi reminded me that we had had 
some talk already together on this violation of good-taste in 
certain works of art.” 

“ It is a defect,” said Philetus, “ which unhappily the over- 
shadowing renown of the immortal poet has made permanent 
in our drama. Servile writers, too timid to follow the coun- 
sels of their more cultivated tastes, and ready at any sacrifice 
of propriety to secure the favor of the multitude, copy these 
very buffooneries, and in this, as in other respects, the false 
divinity of the poet has been of the most pernicious influence 
in his peculiar department of letters.” 

“ It is the usual blighting effect of all superstition,” said 
Philoscommon. “It checks the growth of wholesome judg- 
ment, and with the terrors of its threatened discipline makes 
genius itself cower, fearing lest its independent thought 
should bring on it destruction.” 

“ As it does and will do,” said Philetus. “ Till men shall 
dare to speak the truth, as w r ell as think it, of this powerful 
but undisciplined w r riter, we shall have no complete dramatist, 
as there well might, arise in our language, but our tragedy 
will be what our most successful modern playwright has 
made it, and the stage will resound with fustian, and the 
frigidity of inapplicable ornament be relieved only by the 
vulgar jocularity of improper characters. — But I weary 
you,” he added, turning to Alethi. 

“ O no,” said Alethi. “ Thanks to Philos', I am, as you 
have heard, fresh from the reading, and follow you with 
pleasure. Pray proceed.” 

“Act the Third is, barring a few passages, all excellent, and 
graced especially by that quality for which Dorypalos is fore- 
most among all our bards. I mean magnificence of diction.” 

9 * 


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“ Wherein indeed, if I may venture to interpose my opin- 
ion,” said Philoscommon, “ lies his greatest merit. Other 
writers show for their occasions as intimate a knowledge of 
human nature as lie, and few of any repute have so often and 
absolutely violated it ; several again in comic drama have 
come very near him in both fecundity and brilliancy of wit, 
though there too, despite his frequent affectation and forced 
conceits, he will be long preeminent ; but none are his match 
in force and grandeur of style.” 

“Thank you,” said Philetus; “such is my own sentiment. 
We have in this very Act passages which for actual majesty 
have seldom perhaps been equaled, never in the drama, and 
which certainly are unsurpassable.” 

“ But is it not strange,” resumed Philoscommon, “ that 
such evident taste and judgment as appear to have regulated 
the harmony, the force, the dignity, the majestic emphasis of 
his unrivaled language, should be-vso often wanting else- 
where ? ” 

“ I am not so sure,” replied Philetus, “ that taste and judg- 
ment had so much to do with the qualities of language you 
commend, — or at least judgment, in the exercise of which 
Dorypalos seems to me to have made very great errors. All 
the dramatists of his time are marked by the peculiar and 
generally excellent qualities of their diction, and by the very 
faults therein which degrade him. One of these writers 
indeed, Diaktor, is only so little knowm because of the 
greater brilliancy, variety, and more sustained vigor of Dor- 
ypalos, whose huge growth throws its shadow over him, as 
over smaller men, and keeps them mostly invisible. Thus it 
is that even their merits are merged into his own, as the 
smaller circles of a rippled flood unite their lines with the 
broader, or many waves into one vast billow. And what is 
not less interesting is, that this concretive power of the poet 
has taken in all that he has touched and appropriated. Of 
all plagiaries Dorypalos is perhaps the largest and the bold- 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


203 


est ; but of the vast quantity of matter which is not his own 
no one takes account but his commentators, and they them- 
selves forget it in the common applause. All that is found 
in the deathless plays is his, story, plot, construction, lan- 
guage, everything, though much was taken by him in actual 
bulk that has helped to make up the immensity of his treas- 
ures. We Jesousians have in our good Book, as you probably 
know, a saying that is often quoted in a literal and unin- 
tended sense : To him that has much shall be given muc\ and 
from him that hath little shall be taken away even that little 
that he hath. So has it been with Dorypalos and his com- 
peers. — Shall I go through the play, or dismount from my 
hobby ? ” 

“ Ride away,” cried Philoscommon : “ you sit it well.” 

“ In the Fourth Act, we have in Scene 2. one of those vio- 
lations of probability, which, even if they were not also 
violations of nature, would be displeasing. The strained 
wit of Camffud’s son, out of place although he were adult, 
is absurd as uttered by a child.” 

“ It is in fact the poet talking to the audience, and labor- 
ing with forced laughter to amuse them.” 

“ True ; but this want of nature is very apt to make grown 
people of all of his little ones. — In the next Scene the 
murdered monarch’s heir outdoes his part ; for none but a 
fool, which his hearer is not, would credit so over-drawn 
a picture, because no man who could consciously charge 
himself with all the vices there set down, and to that abom- 
inable degree, would ever so malign himself as to avow them. 
W e come next to the famous Scene (it is in the Fifth Act) 
where the Queen walks in her sleep and talks. It is all ad- 
mirable. But when the tyrant appears we have coarseness, 
and we are surprised to hear that he is grown so old, for 
nothing has prepared us for the lapse of time. Towards the 
end, which is not well wrought, we have him uttering sen- 
tentious maxims which are in fact the poet’s and not his, not 


204 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


even in the language. There are however in this play very 
few of those deviations from the direct purpose of the Scene 
into which Dorvpalos usually falls.” 

“Yet, if I mistake not,” said Philoscommon, “no incon- 
siderable part of the poet’s renown and of its abiding char- 
acter may be attributed to such digressive passages.” 

“You are right,” said Philetus. “They are considered 
among his special beauties. And by themselves they truly are. 
They display in masterly language more moral wisdom than 
will anywhere else be found in the like compass, or they in- 
troduce us to a description where often his sweetness and 
graceful elegance of verbiage compare in their degree of 
merit with his masculine force and majestic vehemence else- 
where. But these beauties, while we profit by them, are as I 
have intimated rarely in place ; the moral sentiment does not 
always suit the character, the description more or less im- 
pedes the action, and both kinds are therefore almost at all 
times unnatural. 

“ I must not forget to add, since I am playing the Aristar- 
chus, that in his desire to be strong he falls easily into the 
fault of being obscure.” 

“ But that obscurity,” said Philoscommon, “ does not seem 
to impair his fame.” 

“ On the contrary, it helps maintain it. Nothing tends 
more to keep a dead author at his height of reputation 
than that which contributed to put him there, the labors 
namely of his commentators, who frequently, through their 
very toil of study becoming partial, are his warmest eulo- 
gists.” 

“ I coincide with you fully, in this as in all your criticism,” 
said Philoscommon. “ I only wish that you had better hear- 
ers than ourselves.” 

“Meaning my own countrymen?” said Philetus. “If I 
should venture to repeat one half of it to them in public, or 
were to print it and publish it — that is, could I find any 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


205 


bookseller to circulate such opinions, — I should be hissed to 
silence or held up to scorn as an ignorant maligner.” 

“ Yet you would speak what is demonstrable not the less. 
Were you to go into a mosque and preach to the worship* 
ers the fallibility of their Prophet, I don’t think you would be 
received with praise. A superstition in literature, if not so 
ferocious, is at least as intolerant as one in religion.” 

“ And sha’n’t I call on you, who so well understand it 
alien though you are, to say something more upon this sub- 
ject ? ” 

“ I think my comments, as Alethi promised, or threatened, 
have not been few. What would you have ? ” 

“ I have given you a minute criticism on the most striking 
passages, as being those which every Philautian has by 
heart. Without taxing your memory for a single line, might 
I not ask you for your opinion of the plot, construction, and 
other characteristics of the play in its entireness ? ” 

“ Of plot, I should say,” replied Philosc, “ it properly has 
none. It is rather a fragment of history in a dramatic form ; 
the actions are not the result of contrivance, but follow the 
course of the story, and the catastrophe marks its antici- 
pated end. There is therefore little more of construction in 
it than the stringing together of its incidents. There is 
scarcely any discrimination of character, for besides the thane 
who executes vengeance, and who is simply a brave, honest 
and frank-hearted man, there are only two well-defined per- 
sonages, the king-killer and his wife, and these have no 
marked difference more than what arises from the parts they 
act ; for when the lady speaks of her lord as having ‘ too 
much of the milk of human kindness,’ she indicates a care- 
lessness in the drawing of the part, such as I have elsewhere 
noted in your poet. The regicide, who almost instantly 
after the salutation of the witches, and before he is alone, 
conceives the thought of murder, is visited by no compunc- 
tion other than what come3 of dread and doubt. He is 


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throughout simply atrocious ; the wife in the sleep-scene suf- 
fers more. The play is animated, interesting, but little sul- 
lied with impurities or embarrassed with digressions, and is 
as a whole so well executed, as to make us regret that one of 
such a genius and so peerless a master of language should 
not have had the judgment to be more complete.” 

“ But in that judgment, whose severity would exclude so 
much that is precious and prune down what is so often won- 
drously luxuriant, besides abbreviating what affords so lively 
and exciting a variety ( I am speaking now of the whole 
series of his plays, ) should we not have lost much more than 
we had gained ? ” 

“ In the poet, perhaps so ; but in the model or the stand- 
ard — since your authors and critics will persist in making 
him one or other, if not both, — I think not. He is the 
glory of your literature, and has enriched your mighty lan- 
guage, but his example, made despotic by unlimited success, 
sits like a nightmare on your art and may make its breathing 
difficult forever.” 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

The discussion carried into the domain of morals, where the 
Schoolmaster opens his companion's eyes unpleasantly. 

“ I wonder,” said Aletlii, when the travelers were alone, 
“ that you did not speak of the influence which Dorypalos 
must exercise upon the morals of this people and of all in- 
deed who read him. It seems to me that he is of all repu- 
table writers, if not the most licentious, yet the most obscene.” 

“ Don’t say that, my dear,” replied the schoolmaster. “ It 
is blasphemous.” 


OP ALETHITHERA8. 


207 


“ Not in me, who am not of the religion. But be serious, 
Philos'.” 

“ In seriousness then, Alethi, I know no poet in all the 
world, certainly no dramatic poet, that can match him in 
dirt. The master of the Old Comedy is sometimes grossly 
obscene, sometimes dirty, but all his nastiness put together 
would not make one tithe of the abominations of Doryp- 
alos.” 

“ Not in Lysistrata ? ” 

“No, not were you to count up all its ribaldry, from 
O vie eidov ov6 ’ — and so on, down. Even that line in its 
naked turpitude, is it worse than w T hat, in the tragic story of 
the youthful lovers, the gallant Certumio, who is considered 
a pattern gentleman in the best Philautian sense, says to the 
Nurse ? The out-spoken impurity of the old Cecropian is sim- 
ply revolting, nor are his double-meanings, being usually wit- 
less, any less disgusting ; the equivoques of the Philautian, 
who is immeasurably his superior in every quality as a comic 
poet, have generally humor and sometimes wit to make them 
readable, but they are so thinly vailed as to be intelligible 
to the most uninstructed and unsophisticated, while in gross- 
ness and licentiousness of idea they are seldom less censura- 
ble and often greatly more so than his, while almost always 
they are very much more corrupting. I have no doubt how- 
ever that this lubricity and indecency add greatly to his pop- 
ularity. Men and women, especially the young, secretly 
hanker after the pictures which such phrases, passages, and 
too often scenes, bring before the imagination. They read 
in fact in Dorypalos what they would blush to be detected 
reading elsewhere, and find delightful this open indulgence 
in a libidinousness of the mind, the more so that in gratify- 
ing it they are not only above suspicion but have the credit 
of intellectual refinement. Cut out of Dorypalos all that is 
objectionable on the score of morality, and his readers w T ould 
diminish ; for all the rest, for the great mass of plainly edu- 


208 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


cated folk, would have little relish, and, it may be added, 
would be often with difficulty intelligible.” 

“ Then, read as these plays are perpetually by this people, 
and all others who cultivate the manly tongue in which they 
are written, their depraving influence must be enormous ? ” 

“Well, Alethi, I don’t know. I am inclined to think that 
men and women, in their natural appetites and the indul- 
gences these call for, are very much the same and ever have 
been everywhere. In Jesousian countries and refined society 
they cover up the impurity, but it peeps out none the less, while 
among the lower classes it outrages decency and often goes 
beyond all bounds of order and of law. Time was in Kemi 
when the women marched in procession in honor of the god 
of wine, bearing what they now would blush to look upon — 
if overseen. The publicity of the ceremony took off the sense 
of shame, and thus broke down the strongest yet most deli- 
cate of the barriers to licentiousness, so that in after days, in 
Ariospolis, the magistracy had to suppress the orgies. But 
are the sex in heart and fancy less impure than then ? I 
doubt it. The talk and gestures of very young girls together 
are as lascivious, if not quite so coarse, as those of boys; 
that is, with the gentle-bred ; the vulgar are as gross as the 
women in Lysistrata , and as salacious as the young lady who 
loves her House’s enemy in the play just mentioned. (By 
the by, she is cited by the Dorypalians as purity itself. So 
much for superstition ! ) As they both grow up, they both 
refine, — that is, with the refined, — the women much more 
generally. But, in the ebullition of the passions does tho 
vile scum never rise again and float atop ? Is the polish of 
the morals ever deeper than the surface ? The poet who has 
employed so much of our talk well understood this. ‘ Be- 
hold,’ he says, ‘yon dame, whose face, &c .’ You will remem- 
ber the passage.” 

“ Its general sense and application,” said Alethi. 

“ That is enough. It is in his noblest tragedy, to my 


OF ALETHITHE R AS. 


209 


mind, but one that is among those most disfigured by im- 
proprieties and especially by that unrepeatable grossness of 
•which we now speak, a grossness which however none dis- 
dain, and the vast majority delight, to read.” 

11 From all this I judge you think as I do, though you will 
not allow there is any real chastity in women.” 

“ Not per se — except in Medamou. But what is your 
thought ? ” 

“ That the influence of this great writer ” 

“ Oh, we have not yet done with him ! — Must be enor- 
mously destructive to the moral purity of the Philautians ? ” 

“ And of others that cultivate the same language.” 

“ Undoubtedly. It renews suggestions that are everywhere 
too frequent to concupiscence, and affords a lawful and ap- 
proved indulgence to sensations of the mind which wisdom 
everywhere commands us to dominate and check. But the 
lower classes do not read Dorypalos, and the lowest cannot 
read at all : yet where will you find grosser or more wide- 
spread licentiousness ? It was lately asserted publicly, by a 
coroner, that in this city alone the number of women who 
had killed their own children to get them out of the way 
amounted to twelve thousand ! ” 

u He must have exaggerated. He could have no real data 
for such an account.” 

“ Perhaps so. But the fact remains nevertheless, that here, 
where are few or no foundling-hospitals, this frightful crime 
is for the population as rife as in Serica. The manufacturing 
towns and districts would give probably a greater number 
in proportion still. There they have burial-clubs, which for 
a weekly contribution engage to pay a certain sum for tho 
interment of children at their death. And it is beyond a 
doubt that numbers have been sacrificed purposely to obtain 
this pittance.” 

“ O, for humanity’s sake ! ” 

“ There you are ! I have read that very appeal against 


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belief this very morning, as I will show you. Men shut their 
eyes against the facts that betray the animality of their fel- 
lows, and proclaim grandly the title of their race, instead of 
helping it to maintain its preeminence by better providing 
against what sinks it to the level and below the level of the 
brutes. Is it worse to murder children for their burial-por- 
tion, than to kill men to sell their bodies for dissection ? 
Yet this was done in this very country several years ago.” 

“ You will make our stay here short, if you have much 
more to teach me of this kind, Pliiloscommon.” 

“ If you are to be deterred by horror and disgust, for what 
have you traveled ? These feelings make us pale and sicken 
everywhere, but nowhere more than in Philautia. A woman 
is even now in prison, who lived by practising child-murder 
for a fee. But what w T ill you say, when I tell you of a 
mother’s killing eight infants in succession by putting arsenic 
on her nipples ? ” 

“ I can’t believe it.” 

“ Yet it is a matter of public record. I read it this morn- 
ing. Fancy her looking at the innocent babies and watch- 
ing them suck their death on the breast of the body where 
they were born. You are aghast. Now listen to this state- 
ment of a daily paper. A Juvernan girl thought to get rid 
of her illegitimate incumbrance in a more ingenious way than 
any practised by the professional childkiller. That is the 
way the Devil tempts all murderers : he shows them how 
the crime was clumsily performed before, and promises them 
to teach a safer mode. So the fiendish creature for three 
weeks together broke one by one her little baby’s bones, 
hoping that the discolored swelling over each place of frac- 
ture would be taken as indicative of natural disease.” 

“ This is too horrible ! ” 

“ O yes ; so, I dare say, thought the surgeon, who counted 
‘ eight broken ribs, a broken shoulder, a fracture of each 
bone of the left fore-arm, another of’ ” 


OP ALE THITHER AS. 


211 


tl Stop ; read no more.” 

“ No, it is enough. But the recorder of this most damna- 
ble wickedness hints at insanity, ‘ which, for the sake of 
human nature , he trusts may be established.’ There is your 
phrase. It is stuff. Humanity is but animal after all, and a 
large portion of those who belong to it use the reason and 
the knowledge which are its prerogatives, to furnish them 
with means of gratifying their animality which dumb and 
wild creatures think not of and have no occasion for. 
When I was in Isopoliteia, a Juvernan woman hurled her 
newborn babe from the roof of the house she lived in to an 
adjoining one, hoping stupidly, or rather with that uncalcu- 
lating impulsiveness which characterizes dangerously her 
people, that the crime would thus be transferred to other 
shoulders. A woman who would break the half-formed body 
of her infant to pieces with instruments would take other 
means, if she durst, with the living ones that are a shame 
and burden to her. Yet this is done continually. It is not 
the way to suppress crime, to believe it impossible except in 
the absence of reason. There are thousands of women in the 
world, who, to parody the words of the murderer’s wife in 
the play we have just attended, would tear the nipple from 
their baby’s gums and dash its brains out, to procure them- 
selves a cup of liquor.” 

“ O Philos' 1 don’t speak so; and don’t believe so! ” 

“ As I have reminded you before, Alethi, I did not make 
the world, and all the protestations you can utter and all 
your disbelief will not alter the fact, that there are hundreds 
of thousands of human beings of both sexes who are as 
thoroughly, and in their hearts as ferociously, animals, as the 
catamount and the tiger.” 




212 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER XXX. 

The 'prize-fight which they did not go to. Philoscommon 
sermonizes on Philautian fair-play. 

“Would you like to see a prize-fight ? ” said the school- 
master one morning. 

“ What is a prize-fight, Philos' ? ” 

“ Certain sporting-men, as they are called, who are always 
men of dissipated life and generally disreputable, make up a 
purse, for which two brawny fellows, naked to the waist 
and with their bare fists, contend under certain regulations. 
The one who makes the other give in, which is usually only 
after the breath is nearly beaten out of his body, one or both 
of his eyes closed up, and the rest of his face pounded to a 
jelly, is declared the conqueror. Of course the more terribly 
he is beaten, the better the sport, and the satisfaction is in- 
creased if the victor himself be nearly spent and have his 
own head scarcely distinguishable from a football.” 

“You cannot be serious in asking me to go to such an ex- 
hibition ? ” 

“ Why, there is a very large and very promiscuous attend- 
ance, Alethi. Men of decided rank mingle there with the 
most equivocal in position, reverend parsons (it is said) 
stand secretly in the shadow of most irreverent blackguards, 
and the ruffian and the dicer are for once cheek by jowl 
with substantial men of ease who pique themselves upon the 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


213 


whiteness of their linen and merchants who never have an 
error in their balance-sheet. You would not be noticed.” 

“Philos', you are joking. Would you stand there, in 
such a crowd, and see two fellow-beings make brutes of 
themselves ? ” 

“ Alethi, I want you to turn your back upon cant, and 
look these things directly in the face. The objection to 
such exhibitions lies in the vile assembly they call together. 
If two men choose to stand up to a fair fight, or to wrestle 
together in the manner of the ancients, I don’t see why they 
should not be indulged. Man is certainly a fighting animal, 
and to seek to check his combative propensities is to dispute 
the wisdom and beneficence of the Creator, who has seen fit 
to make him so. I see often in the streets, and everywhere 
but in Medamou, w r ould-be-benevolent individuals who sepa- 
rate two boys that are at fisticuffs, and act with an earnest- 
ness in the matter as if the little athletes were committing a 
crime and they .never themselves had been in anywise guilty 
of it. I never interfere, or, did I do so, it would be to 
encourage the less courageous one and see fair play. It is an 
interesting display of the nature of the male animal, and I 
believe that every man who knows himself and does not fear 
to speak his mind w'ould admit it to be so.” 

“ Then you really would like to see this fight ? ” 

“No, I would not go if I could be there unseen and un- 
contaminated by the contact of the rascals who mostly attend 
it. I should have no relish for a combat so conducted, where 
they do not fight on till one is worsted, but stop and breathe 
and go at it again, round after round ( as they call it,) and in 
the most business-like manner, giving and inflicting injury by 
rules, and measuring valor by endurance and skill by the 
suffering inflicted. The peculiar attraction of the present 
fight lies in the fact, that it is to be between a veteran Phil- 
autian pugilist and a raw Isopoliteian who has crossed the 
sea expressly to contend for what these fools, with ridicu- 


214 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 




lous inflation, call ‘the championship of the world.’ You 
see, these journals are full of it, and while affecting, in the 
usual name of humanity, to deplore the exhibition which dis- 
graces that humanity, they do all they can to give it promi- 
nence and to incite a longing to witness its brutalities, so 
that, were it not for the disgrace of the association and were 
there none, I believe that half the better part of Chaunopo- 
lis would be there.” 

“ But we shall not, under any circumstances.” 

“ No, but I want you to watch the result. This people 
boasts perpetually its love of fair play. It is the Philautian 
claim of claims. If this fellow from across the seas shall be 
the victor, as he may, to judge from his confidence and that 
of his backers, you will see w T hat this fair-play will amount 
to.” 

Notwithstanding the repeated announcement of the in- 
tended fight, for several months in advance in all the jour- 
nals of the kingdom, and all the preparations of the training 
of the combatants were openly discussed, the laws, which 
pretend in the interests of good order and morality to put 
down such combats, were unable to prevent the exhibition ’s 
coming off. The fight was bravely and obstinately fought, 
but in the issue the transmarine antagonist was likely to be- 
come the victor ; whereupon a rush was made against the 
barriers, the ring was broken up, and the conquest was de- 
clared undecided. 

“You see,” said Pliiloscommon, as he read of the tumult- 
uous scene, “ it is as I predicted. The love of fair play is 
easily forgotten by these boastful islanders, when it no longer 
is to their advantage.” 

“But was not the national antipathy and jealousy to 
blame ? ” said Alethi. “ You have said they hold in special 
dislike the Isopoliteians.” 

“ Do you remember, at the horserace which we attended 
some days since, when the Alectryon horse Mirmillo won the 


OP ALE THITHER AS. 


215 


people hissed ? You ’were astonished then and disgusted, 
and wished to believe it was in the hereditary hatred of the 
Philautians for their ancient enemies.” 

“ Nor have you yet convinced me to the contrary.” 

“ Perhaps this kindred act will help me. These people 
would undoubtedly, Alethi, prefer to be beaten in these 
peaceful contests by any others than the nations they dislike, 
and fear, and envy. This is natural. But had the victor 
come from Medamou, or Pantacliou, it had been all the same. 
Their self-love and superstitious belief in the unsurpassable 
qualities of their own nation admit of no contradiction and 
suffer no rebuke. Strange as it may seem to you, when the 
man from Yesputia ventured to challenge the best pugilist in 
their kingdom, the whole people, gentle and simple, were 
roused as if by a personal attack. I see nothing, myself, par- 
ticularly remarkable in this egotism, and I have no doubt 
the Isopoliteians were, despite their good sense, quite as 
foolish in regard to their self-appointed champion. But I 
do very much doubt whether they, or any other honorable 
people, would have taken such means to prevent the success 
of the other side, as did these boastful lovers of fair-play. 
In fact, it is their character as I have read it : per fas et nef- 
as, — if fair means will not effect the object of their national 
pride, or hate, or envy, or commercial avarice, they will re- 
sort, as they ever have resorted, to foul. In the last war 
between them and the Isopoliteians, when the latter, to their 
great astonishment as well as that of the rest of the world, 
proved to be their betters in almost every naval contest, the 
government ordered their commanders to overcome a certain 
commodore of the enemy in any way he could, only to over- 
come him. Accordingly, with two ships they attacked him 
where he lay in the supposed shelter of a neutral port in 
Colonia.” 

“ And is this really the character of this manly and seem- 
ingly generous people ? ” 


216 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ I am forced to say it is. Attack but the prestige of their 
supposed supremacy in any field of human exertion, and you 
will see disappear at once all fairness, open emulation su- 
perseded by trickery and treacherous supplanting, and can- 
dor give place to falsehood, malignant criticism and detrac- 
tion. Should a war ever arise again between these Powers, 
or between the Isopoliteians and some other people less ob- 
noxious, and the Pliilautians should have an opportunity to 
do a mischief indirectly, perhaps even directly, to those 
rivals, depend upon it they will do so, aiding in every un- 
derhand way their antagonists, and adding to the injury of 
their malevolent acts barefaced calumnies and the most inso- 
lent distortion of every point to their advantage.” 

“You picture a detestable people ; yet Philetusis of them.” 

“ Does not the full and sound grain grow on the same 
stalk with that which is small and mildewed ? And are the 
apples of one tree all equally good, or bad, or indifferent ? 
There are no nobler men to be found anywhere than many 
of these same islanders, and the vices I speak of are ascriba- 
ble in no small degree to the exercise of power, the spread 
of commercial enterprise, and the necessities of their circum- 
scribed and insular position. With them, to stand still is, 
more than with other men, to fall away, to sink in the scale 
of nations, whereon hitherto they have stood topmost. Can 
they look with complacency on the means of their humilia- 
tion and their ruin ? ” 

“ That is but to palliate their national vices, not to justify 
them.” 

“True. Could they be justified, they would cease to be 
vices. This corruption, Alethi, is in everything. You have 
heard how wretched, how degraded, how brutalized are the 
largest part of the laboring population, in both town and 
country. But the whole trading-system of this kingdom, 
whose greatness and whose very life depend on trade, is pro- 
nounced by the foremost of its own journals to be rotten to 


OF ALETHITHEIIAS. 


217 


the core. When a bank goes down, like that in a great 

northern city, it opens an. abyss of fraud above which many 

others have had their unsubstantial but showy structures 

standing for years, and to trade on borrowed capital, without 

the possibility of repaying it in the twentieth part in case 

of misfortune, is not the exception in this metropolis. 

Everything we eat or drink here is sophisticated that is not 

too simple to admit of fraud. A prominent surgical journal 

tells us that redlead is mixed with capsicum to increase its 

weight ; one of the most eminent authors in their medical 

literature shows that confectioners adulterate their sugar- 

© 

plums with gypsum, and under the name of humuline the 
deadly principle of the poisonous nux vomica is secretly sold 
to the brewers who make bitter-ale.” 

“ But is Philautia alone in these iniquities ? ” 

“ No, they are Pantachousian. A large part of the wines 
and brandy that come from Alectoreion are purely factitious. 
I saw in a paper in Isopoliteia the advertisement of a for- 
eign apothecary, who had powders for the manufacture of 
every liquor that has cursed the world since Noah disrobed 
himself. The very oil for our salads is sweetened when ran- 
cid by dipping into it plates of lead. And what your baker 
puts into his bread to whiten and to lighten it, nobody ex- 
actly knows outside of the bakehouse. In fact, Alethi, it is 
almost dangerous to eat and drink anything but the fruits 
of the earth and the rain from the sky. The safest way is 
of course to buy the dearest and to live where rank and 
wealth require the best. But what must the poor do ? At 
a trial in this city, it w T as shown that of a certain kind of 
low-priced tea not a leaf was there but what had grown on 
the hedges of Philautia. Happy they who buy the dried 
leavings of the teapots of the hotels, which are gathered and 
sold to certain grocers by the servants, and who deny them- 
selves sugar whose weight is helped by dirt ! ” 

10 


218 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


i 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

Athlia. 

On an appointed evening, Philetus came to take our trav- 
elers to tlie opera. 

“ I have come thus early,” he said, “ because I wish first to 
make you known to Ath'lia, the lady I mentioned to you. I 
am in hopes you will persuade her to go with us.” 

“ I think not,” said Philoscommon very positively. 

“ Why not ? ” asked Philetus. 

“ Because ” — The schoolmaster hesitated. “ Because she 
would not go with me. And she ought not, if I am right.” 
The color rose to Philetus 1 cheeks. “ But let not that em- 
barrass you ; I can stay behind.” 

“ No, that shall not be,” said Philetus. “ What an extra- 
ordinary person you are ! I should have thought of this 
myself; but I did not.” He became still more embarrassed, 
seeming to feel that he had said too much. But the uncon- 
cerned schoolmaster came to his relief. 

“ Does she readily go out with you ? ” he asked. 

“ Why, no,” replied Philetus, coloring again, but evidently 
with another emotion. 

“Do not be displeased,” said the schoolmaster. “I don’t 
mean to be impertinent. But you will see that it is best to 
put this matter in its true light. I am too used to ridicule 
because of my unlucky figure to mind it ; and I could not 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


219 


afford to, for I must go out, and I must mix more or less with 
the world. This is not the case with that lady, and it is very 
plain that my company would not diminish her sensitive- 
ness.” 

This was rather delicate speaking for Pliiloscommon, who 
might have been expected to put the matter much more 
strongly, and he had instantly his reward in Philetus’ look. 
“ Come,” he continued, “is she fond of music ? ” 

“Fond?” cried Philetus, his fine eyes sparkling. “You 
shall hear her sing.” 

“No, let her to-night go with you and Alethi; I shall not 
miss the spectacle.” 

“That must not be,” said the poet, firmly: “I have en- 
gaged you to go with me ; and I do not mean to let you 
sacrifice yourself. Athlia can go some other night, — if she 
will,” he added with melancholy. “ So now get ready, for, 
as I have made up -my mind to take you both to her this 
evening, and I have her permission, we shall go there first.” 

Athlia was alone in the room with her mother, who was a 
respectable, pleasant-looking, full-bosomed dame of about 
forty years. The girl was quite a different creation. She 
sat in a corner of the sofa, probably both to ease and to hide 
the deformity of her spine, her feet, which were well-formed, 
upon a cushioned stool. Her face was very beautiful ; the 
complexion colorless, but not sickly, the features finely pro- 
portioned; a mouth not small, but perfectly well-formed, 
and which wore an expression of habitual melancholy, re- 
lieved at times, as was afterwards seen when she conversed, 
by a smile which showed the whole of a faultless set of teeth, 
the row having that not very common oval form to which 
the lips seem closely fitted, so that when they part, in smiling, 
the very hindmost teeth are for the moment seen as plainly 
as the rest. It is very fascinating in some women, this kind 
of smile, and Athlia’s soft and melancholy green-gray eyes 
lent ravishment to the attraction. Though her forehead w r as 


220 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


high, the hair grew lower on it than is usual. This was fine 
and brown, — so fine that there seemed a kind of frailty in 
its texture that made you sad. She wore it parted on the 
crown and falling in heavy loose ringlets to her shoulders all 
around, perhaps to vail her deformity. It concealed indeed 
the shape of the shoulders, but not the want of space between 
them and the head. 

“Athlia,” said Philetus, “these are the strangers I men- 
tioned to you. I hope you will know their worth as I do, 
and count them of your friends as I am proud to have them 
for mine.” 

Athlia did not rise, as her mother had done when a similar 
ceremony was previously gone through with her, but she 
made a slight inclination as if she would do so, and gave 
her white and thin hand in turn to each. Philoscommon 
noticed in her eyes that her heart shrunk from him instinct- 
ively, while it bounded toward his companion. “ I do not 
•wonder,” said the little sage to himself. “ She sees in me the 
hideous caricature of herself, in Alethi but the duplicate of 
Philetus. I shall not put her to the shock again.” 

In fact, he at once addressed his attentions to the mother, 
though invited to the sofa by many hints from Philetus, who 
wanted to draw him out for Athlia’s entertainment. Pres- 
ently a look from the young lady opened the poet’s eyes, and 
lie saw that the strange little man was acting with his usual 
judgment, and let him, though reluctantly, alone. 

But, though occupied, the sage of Medamou kept one of 
liis large ears open to the sofa, and heard quite enough to 
satisfy him that Athlia -was as intelligent and amiable, as she 
was in face lovely. 

Of course she refused to accompany them to the opera ; 
but her lover would have her sing, and she suffered herself, 
although with manifest reluctance, to be led to the piano. 
As she seemed to be aware, no position could have been 
chosen to show her person to more disadvantage. Mounted 


OP A L E T II I T H E R A S . 


221 


on the stool, the poor little thing, with her back partially 
toward, the visitors, was made ludicrous. Philoscommon 
himself, though near one of the ends of the instrument, 
looked aside, and Alethi, who was more behind, put his 
hand over his forehead, prepared to listen thoughtfully with- 
out looking on her. But in a few moments the painfulness, 
the absurdity of the situation was forgotten. The thin white 
fingers touched lightly the keys in an unadorned symphony 
to an adagio movement. But even in these brief and simple 
notes both the travelers recognized taste and culture, and 
their attention was arrested. Then came from the beautiful 
mouth the sweetest and most touching sounds they deemed 
they had ever heard. It was a simple ballad-song she sung, 
of disappointed love, set by a popular composer to a melan- 
choly yet tender and affecting air ; a kind of music in which 
the Philautians have not been unsuccessful. But never surely 
had the strains been sung as then, by such a voice, with such 
expression. Philoscommon, full of wonder, turned his eyes 
directly on the singer and saw no more her figure, while her 
face grew to him angelical. What was the matter with 
Alethi it was hard to say, for his hand never left the fore- 
head, and when Philetus came up to the friends with an air 
of triumph, he turned abruptly away. 

“ Have I kept my promise ? ” said the poet. 

“ You see,” said Philoscommon, very low, and indicating 
by a look Alethi. 

“ Does he not like it ? ” asked Philetus with a painful sur- 
prise. 

“ How can you be so blind ? ” said Philoscommon. “ Let 
him recover.” 

“ Now Athlia,” said Philetus, “ as we are going to the 
opera, will you gratify me by letting our friends see how 
well you understand our higher music ? ” 

Athlia looked to Alethi, and apparently satisfied with the 
expression of his face, though he said nothing, selected 


223 


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another volume, and without prelude commenced a brief 
Scena and Rondo from a classic opera of pure taste which 
had been recently revived. Philoscommon here felt an added 
interest; the subject was the finest episode of one of his fa- 
miliar poets. And when in the character of Orpheus after 
his loss, 

“ Cum subita incautum dementia cepit amantem,” 

Athlia’s noble voice, now showing all its depth as well as 
pow T er, struck out with that fervor yet solemn pathos of expres- 
sion in which she excelled, “ Ahi me ! dove trascorsi ? ove mi 
spinse un delirio d’ amor ? ” the little man was almost beside 
himself. For Alethi, his very marrow seemed to thrill ; and 
when the lady, in whose situation toward Philetus there ap- 
peared to be something that lent a reality to the imaginary 
scene, cried out, “ Saziati, Sorte rea ; son disperato ! ” he 
actually shivered. 

When the Eondo, that truly poetical and delicious air, 
Che faro, was over, Philetus after helping Athlia to her seat, 
turned silently, his cheeks however very pale and his eyes 
intensely bright, to the travelers. 

“ Let us not go to-night to the opera,” said Alethi to him 
softly. 

“ Do you hear that, Athlia ? ” said the delighted lover, as 
he took her hand. “ Our friends are so satisfied, they do not 
want to hear other music to-night.” 

“ Yet let them go,” said Athlia quietly and with a sad 
smile, though her color slightly rose ; “ they w r ill there be 
disenchanted.” Then turning to the strangers, she added, 
“And do not let me keep you any longer ; you will be late for 
the ballet. But, another night, we hope to see you again.” 
She gave her hand to Alethi ; the mother did the same for 
Philoscommon ; and the three gentlemen left. 


OF ALETHITHERAS, 


223 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

The ballet-dancers. 

“ I dosj’t know why this theatre always bears the title of the 
sovereign, whether it be King or Queen,” said Philetus, as 
they entered the spacious house, “ except that the sovereign’s 
own tongue is never heard from the performers. Where we 
listened to the lofty speech and flowing rhythm of Dorypalos 
the other night, the playhouse bore the name of the locality ; 
here the show-place of foreign mimes and dancers and the 
stage of a foreign lyric drama is honored as the monarch’s 
own.” 

The ballet had commenced. It represented a story called 
in Alectryon the Temptation, and taken from the drama of 
the Scholar and the Devil of the chief Micromereian poet. 
The scene represented the cavern of Hell. Down a long 
flight of steps, which, unnecessary for devils, was meant 
to persuade the spectator that he saw the bottom of the bot- 
tomless abyss, descended with a majestic strut the pompous 
prince of the infernal regions, ushering to their curiosities 
the philosopher. With a most pretentious wave of the arm 
and conceited look, which showed how much an upstart the 
Devil is, he points to the charms of certain beauties whom 
he evokes from nothingness, and the philosopher chooses one 
to be his conqueror : and so on, with the usual extravagance 
and utter w r ant of nature of pantomime, which seeks to show 
by gesticulation what is never indicated except by speech 


\ 


224 


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and outrages reason by an exhibition of the dumb vaporings 
of idiocy and insanity. There was of course the chief attrac- 
tion of the ballet, dancing; and when the curtain fell, Phi- 
letus asked Alethi how he had been gratified. 

By the female dancers, much,” said Alethi. “ There is 
grace and rhythm in their motions. After the first shock of 
the display, one forgets its immodesty, and follows their 
well-timed and elastic movements like a pleasing music. 
But the men have nothing but force and agility ; and their 
tight clothing, which fits to every swell and indentation of 
the body, is positively indecent. In fact, men, rarely grace- 
ful, never should be dancers ; and these are but lascivious 
buffoons.” 

Philetus turned to Philoscommon, whose eyes and nose, 
to the amusement of those who were happy enough to see 
the little man in the crowd, were keeping up a double ac- 
companiment to Alethi’s observation. “I have been con- 
tent,” said the sage, “ to gather my ‘criticism from the 
house.” He looked facetious. 

“ Bo let us have it,” said Philetus. 

“ You had better stop your ears,” interposed Alethi. 

“ So the fools did to Wisdom,” retorted Philoscommon, 
fresh from his sacred reading. She cried, like me, 1 in the 
chief place of concourse — Behold I will pour out my spirit 
unto you — and no man regarded.’ ” 

“ I at least,” said Philetus, smiling, “ am her most devout 
admirer. Let her speak.” 

“ I observed that when the females danced, the gentlemen 
alone were, like Alethi here, excited ; but, when the males 
were showing their flexors and extensors, all the ladies in 
the boxes had their little telescopes directed at them — a 
fearful battery ! and I thought of the lines, 

* Cheironomon Ledam molli saltaute Bathyllo, 

Tnccia — can't hold her tears — 

. Thymele tunc rustica disci t. M ’ 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


225 


“And that is the moral,” quoth Alethi. “Didn’t I tell 
you ? ” 

“It is a just one,” returned Philetus. ' “lam glad that 
Atlilia would not come. But hark ! the baton of the con- 
ductor. We shall now have something for the ears.” 

“ But look behind you when they are at it,” said the 
schoolmaster, “and you will find the belles and beaux are 
all chatting. 

* Segnius irritant animos demissa per anrem 
Quam quae sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus ’ ; 

the sensations afforded by the eyes are more intelligible and 
come nearer the inwards.” 

When the travelers were set down at their lodgings, it was 
past midnight, and the Sunday morning, and Philetus would 
not go in. So alone in their apartment they discussed the 
opera, and Alethi said, “ But Athlia’s songs were worth it 
all. There was no voice there like hers.” 

“ None with such .expression.” 

“ And that was of the soul. It was the requisite in what 
she sung. Surely never was purer music than that air ; and 
never had it better rendering.” 

“ I think with you,” said Philoscommon, “ and find some 
reason in Philetus’ madness.” 

“ Some ? ” echoed Alethi. “ To me it seems that with that 
lovely face Athlia thus singing is resistless.” 

“ Yes, with such a voice, I might myself be irresistible,” 
said Philoscommon. “Fancy me perched at the piano — 
bah ! we have none here ; or at the harp,” ( he assumed the 
attitude, ) “ and singing to some evanished Eurydice. — 
Dove andro senza il mio ten? Banes they are, too often, 
whether Minnchens or Mehetabels. — Dove andro , die faro , 
dove andro senza il mio ben, dove andro senza ” ( an am- 
bitious cadenza ) “ il mio ben.” 

It was the richest of caricatures. There he stood, tho 
rapt singer, with hands outstretched on each side of his in- 
10 * 


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visible instrument, liis fingers moving back and forwards 
and up and down on tlie impalpable wires, and right foot 
lifted as if to j>ress the pedals, while he threw back his head, 
and looking upward like an inspired David, poured out in 
liis not incapable baryton the drollest imitations. He would 
have put in ecstacy the soul of Gluck. 

“ You are incorrigible,” said Alethi, when he could articu- 
late for laughter. “ I do believe you would find something 
to make you laugh at my funeral.” 

“ Have you then remembered me in your will ? Io son pure 
il tuo fedele ,” ( keeping all the while the attitude, ) “ io son 
pure il tuo fcdel ! ” 

“ It is Sunday morning,” said Alethi. 

“And we must do as Pliilautians do. So we will stop 
our pi pes and take to smoking. Or let us have some punch.” 

“ No, go to bed.” 

“Well, good night, ’Lcthi. This is my candle. Che 
faro senza Mehetabele f ” ( perdendosi piangevolmente. ) The 
little rump and bifurcation disappeared. 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 

The travelers make an excursion into the world of spirits. 

“ Do you believe in spirits, Philos 7 ? ” 

“ What kind of spirits ? Cheerful spirits ? or spirits that 
cheer ? Bottled spirits ? ” 

“ No, bodiless spirits ; ghosts of the departed.” 

“ Revisiting the glimpses of the moon, as Philetus’ poet 
would say ? Do I believe that insubstantiality can put on 
substance, and that what is of its nature invisible can be 
seen by the eyes of the flesh ? If the soul can assume the 
shape and attributes of the body, it ceases to be spirit, and 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


227 


cannot appear and disappear by mere volition ; if not, bow 
can it occupy an air for which it lias no adaptation, and be 
visible to organs that cannot make shape of vacuity ? ” 

“ Then you do not believe in table-rappings ? ” 

“ Made by entities that have no knuckles, or repossessing 
their bony frameworks ( as bottomless a fancy as St. Cecilia’s 
cherubim ) would have no muscles to move them ? If I sup- 
posed the soul had the power to make itself perceptible to 
humanity without the being of humanity, could I believe 
that it would take so vulgar and ridiculous, so uncertain and 
capricious a mode of manifestation as by knocks upon the 
bottom of a table ? If it could have a hand to use, it could 
have a tongue ; or does that separation from the body which 
we suppose refines and enlightens it make it reject the dis- 
tinguishing organ of human intelligence, to adopt the signals, 
for example, of a sagacious dog ? But it is a waste of reason 
to argue on such foolery. It is to presume an impossibility 
in order to dispute, its existence. But what put that ques- 
tion into your head ? ” 

“A notice in this paper,” said Alethi, handing* him a 
journal in which he had been reading, “ of the jugglery, or 
foolery as you call it, of two men, brothers they pretend to 
be, from Vesputia, who allow each his wrists to be tied to- 
gether with any form of knot, and then are shut up in a sort of 
dark closet, like a sentry-box, with an opening in the upper 
part ; whereupon the spirits in their service untie them, play 
on musical instruments, and end by flinging through the 
opening tambourines and fiddles at the heads of the au- 
dience.” 

“ Who, if not struck with conviction, are at least with 
something more real than astonishment.” Philoscommon, 
with many interjectional comments of his mobile features, 
glanced over the article. “ Let us go,” he said. “I should 
like to see what sort of dupes the Philautians make. In 
Isopoliteia spiritualism counts its believers by thousands, and 


/ 


228 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


men of education who are otherwise sane are sometimes 
found among the foolish ones. They have even there a jour- 
nal devoted to its interests, and a wilder piece of balderdash 
than the principal matter it would be difficult to to conceive, 
except it should emanate from a lunatic-asylum. I was one 
day in an omnibus, in one of the great cities there, when a 
respectable elderly man beside me, who had this very papei; 
in his hand, asked me if I had seen it. Supposing that he 
looked upon it with the same eyes that I did, I answered, 
‘ Yes ; and I am very much surprised that such a paper should 
have lived through a second number here.’ — ‘ Why ? ’ he 
asked. — ‘Because it is the most unintelligible fustian and 
irrational religious speculation that was ever put in type. 
A gallimaufry compounded by a madman and served up by 
a fool ought to have little relish for so shrewd a people as 
yours.’ — ‘ That madman and fool ( for they are one, ) ’ he 
answered, ‘ you will yet see at the head of all human science. 
It is because we are a shrewd people that we are beginning to 
comprehend the reach of his stupendous intellect.’ — ‘ Then 
you believe in this — doctrine ? ’ — ‘ Believe ? You might 
as well ask me if I believe you have a nose.’ — ‘ Why no ; 
you would be blind if you did n’t see that ; there is nothing 
spiritual in at all.’ Others, near enough to hear us despite 
the noise of the wheels, smiled at this; but he did 'not. ‘I 
see,’ he said testily, ‘ you are one of those who would not be 
convinced though one should rise from the dead.’ — ‘Yes, I 
should, if I saw him. Did you ever see one ? ’ — ‘ Not with 
my eyes ; ’ he answered firmly ; ‘ these are incapable ; but with 
my mind often. I have conversed with many nightly.’ — 
‘ And what did they tell you that was new or useful ? ’ — 
‘ Everything. I have had my intellect expanded as it never 
was before. I reason better and I calculate better. I buy and 
sell by their direction, and have prospered through them in 
my business.’ — ‘ It is a wonder then,’ I said, ‘ that you and 
others who talk with these decarnalized and sublimated in- 


OP ALETHITHEKAS. 


229 


telligences have not made the world wiser in many points in 
which it would be glad to be enlightened. Every great and 
good intellect has either instructed or delighted more or less 
the human mind ; but your spiritualists, although they press 
the other world into their service, have never given us one 
decent work in poetry, or science, or the arts.’ — ‘ They have 
given us all of them ! There never was a poet or an artist 
that was not a spiritualist ! ’ he exclaimed, loudly and vehe- 
mently, talking, as indeed he had done from the first, like a 
man who thought himself really wonderful and wished other 
men to see it. ‘ That is something new, 1 1 said. ‘Was Doryp- 
alos a spiritualist ? was the painter of the Last Judgment?' 1 
— ‘Yes, they both owed all their genius to inspiration of the 
spirits, though neither knew it. 1 — ‘ Then I suppose the spirits 
must be answerable for all the nastiness of the one and the 
improprieties and extravagancies of the other. I see they 
have dirty fellowa as well as fools in the world below. 1 He 
was too indignant to reply, but dashing his hand over his 
paper, to smooth it, with a vehemence that made it sound, 
immersed himself again in the senseless bombast which he 
mistook for sublimity. 11 

There was a large assemblage in the Hall where the 
brothers exhibited. Everything went off according to the 
preannouncement, including the farewell instrumental-accom- 
paniments. When the closet was opened, the two men 'were 
found of course untied, and, very naturally, in a profuse per- 
spiration. The spectators had had the worth of their money 
and rose to leave. 

“ How contemptible ! 11 said Aletlii. 

“ What ? 11 asked a grave-looking man, who had sat on the 
other side of the schoolmaster and now came face to face 
with the younger traveler. 

“ The whole of this spectacle, 11 replied the latter. 

“ But the dupes,” interposed Philos', “ more than the 
cheats.” 


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“ Then you do not believe in spirits ? ” said the man to 
Philos', in a cynical yet excited tone. 

“ No,” was the significant answer ; “ I as yet don’t need a 
keeper.” 

“ Then what do you believe ? ” said the man, putting on 
his gloves with much energy. 

“ In witches,” answered Pliiloscommon, with perfect 
gravity. 

“ In witches ? echoed the questioner, seemingly at a loss 
how to take the answer. 

“ Antiquated ladies who stroke black cats and ride to the 
moon on broomsticks.” 

“ Either you are out of your senses, or you are jesting im- 
pertinently,” said the Philautian sternly. 

“ Why should I be one, or do the other ? ” replied the 
philosopher with perfect calmness. “ You don’t wear a 
strait-waistcoat and you are too atrabilarious to play the 
fool ; yet what is an old woman’s amble in air on a bare 
mophandle to the knocking of boneless knuckles on the 
underside of a table, or the stroking of ramcats with bony 
fingers to the playing on fiddles without any fingers at all ? ” 
The Philautian quit the arena. 

Two or three persons, who having their way out barred by 
the spiritualist had listened with some amusement to the 
dialogue, laughed at this conclusion, and one of them, as 
they passed our travelers, said to Philos', “ Bravo ! I see all 
are not fools here.” 

“No,” said the little man, clapping on his hat; “you at 
least, gentlemen, deserve to have been born in Medamou.” 

“ Medamou ? Medamou ? Where is that ? ” said one after 
another, stopping and turning. 

“ A place where tubs stand always on their bottoms and 
people never do.” 

When the friends had gained the street, 

“ Is there anything,” said Philos', “ that men will not 


OF ALETIIITIIEKAS, 


231 


X 

believe — except tlie truth? That irritable Philautian was 
the very counterpart of my old man of the omnibus.” 

“ But they are not all caught by such palpable cheats as 
this ? ” 

“ Not perhaps as directly explainable, but quite as palpable 
for all that. Animal-magnetism with its clairvoyance is as 
impudent a joggle as table-turning, and the whole tribe of 
mediums are either conscious impostors, or, duped by their 
vanity which is tickled by the wonder they excite, the agents 
of imposture. If a human being claims to be able to call up 
the souls of half-a-dozen other men or women’s grandmothers, 
in what does he differ from other necromancers, except that 
his mode of manifesting this pretended power is puerile in. 
the extreme ? The witch of Endor may be made an awful 
personage, but your modern medium who brings his goblin 
under the table, or makes him answer written questions by 
letters of the alphabet, is a mountebank of very vulgar attri- 
butes and of second-rate pretensions. Why the deuse don’t 
these fellows summon up the soul of Cheops, for example, 
and make him read his hieroglyphics, or foretell the course 
of empire like Anchises in the Shades ? ” 

“ But how is it, Philos', that while all this to you and to 
me appears such barefaced trickery and so puerile foolery, 
hundreds and thousands run to consult the oracle, and that 
there is none of these impostors who wants for dupes even 
among the ’well-bred and intelligent ? ” 

“Because of human egotism. Every man believes in a 
special Providence for himself, but ignores it or never thinks 
of it for his neighbor. Hence he is ready to believe that the 
laws of nature can be transcended in his peculiar behalf, and 
drops the skepticism which he applies to others’ spiritual 
visitations to assume the most fatuous credulity when it 
comes to one of his own. Take this for granted, Alethi, — 
nothing in the w r orld is ever done by supernatural agency. 
When we, using the strongest phrase which language, always 


232 


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too weak to paint the attributes of tlie Deity, supplies us 
with, call Him in perfect faith the Omnipotent, we cannot 
deny that He might Himself subvert the laws lie has set 
upon Creation. But would He do so ? The world might be 
turned upside down. Is it likely to be, merely to excite the 
wonder of ten persons out of ten thousand millions ? Does 
the Almighty stoop to the sleight-of-hand of the mounte- 
bank ? ” 


CHAPTER XXXIY. 

They attend an election , and are satisfied with the beauties 
of restricted suffrage . 

It was an interesting moment in Philautia. The septen- 
nial elections for the popular assembly were taking place ; 
and Philetus, who had accompanied our travelers into the 
country, promised to show them the humors of the scenes. 

“ It is one of the excellencies of our constitution,” he said, 
“ that every seventh year a renovation must take place in 
that great body, which otherwise would feel the languor of 
prolonged existence and become indifferent to duties for 
neglecting which it could not be promptly punished by sus- 
pension from the honors attending them : and indeed, as it 
is, there are always manifest before the end of the term signs 
of this supineness and drowsiness of age.” 

“But since you admit,” said Philoscommon, “that the 
body loses its activity before its dissolution, might it not 
with advantage be oftener regenerated ? ” 

“ I do not see how that could be done with safety,” replied 
Philetus. “If long uniformity is apt to beget supineness, 
too frequent renovation would be attended by the greater 
danger of instability.” 


OP ALETIIITIIERAS. 


233 


“ Is it so in Isopoliteia ? ” said Philoscommon with a smile. 

“ Isopoliteia ? ” cried Philetus, with somewhat of surprise 
and much more of disdain. “You would hardly compare 
the selected assemblage of Pliilautian wisdom and virtue 
with the windy-tongued and feather-brained mob elected by 
a rabblement.” 

“ No,” replied Philoscommon carelessly ; “ it would be 
difficult to find any such in any country. The rabblement, 
by which I suppose you mean to designate the hoi jpolloi of 
universal suffrage, are indeed not always clean, or hand- 
some, or virtuous, specimens of humanity, but they have in 
the mass as clear an idea of their own interests as any other 
bodies of men. The elect of careful electors would be indeed 
discreet ; but where are such electors to be found ? Not in 
Philautia, where often it is the best men that are excluded, 
and the leaden if not feather brained give their uncouth 
voices — w T hose wind is fitter to blow the froth from a pot 
of ale — in favor of a man whose principles they understand 
not, but whose pocket they have perfectly sounded. Here , 
as I see by your looks your candor compels you to admit, is 
not the model of parliamentary purity and freedom. Where 
is it then ? Not in Alectoreion. Have you ever been in 
Isopoliteia ? ” 

“No,” said Philetus, blusliingly. “ Have you ? ” 

“ I have,” said Philoscommon. 

“ And did you find it there? ” asked Philetus with interest. 

“ I did not. Isopoliteia is not superhuman. If you ever 
go there, you will find that the mote in her political eye is a 
pretty large one ; but, before you feel the wish to pluck it 
out, look back, and without glasses you will see something 
bigger in both the optics of Philautia.” 

They reached the scene. It was a rudely constructed, ele- 
vated stand or scaffold, with seats, and a shed to protect the 
occupants from the weather. A dense crow T d was assembled, 
very noisy, and very many in it — both voters and non-voters 


234 


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— well-filled with drink. There were some vulgar women 
in the outer edge of the assemblage. A young nobleman 
came forward on the stage, and was introduced by one of his 
accompanying friends, who presented him as “a cock of the 
game, with not a white feather about him.” 

“That is just what I am,” said the candidate, who held 
his hat in his hand, twirling it with some embarrassment, 
with the hollow part towards him, “ and what you will find 
me, if you do me the honor — to — to — What the devil 
shall I say ? ” he asked aside, of his friend. 

“ Crow, if you can’t speak,” cried one of the crowd, while 
another instantly imitated a cock, which caused great mer- 
riment. 

“ I was about to say, gentlemen What was it ? ” 

“ O, about a cock.” 

“ No, it was n’t ; nor a bull either. — I was about to 
say ” — ( here he looked into his hat, which was observed 
with laughter by the crowd — ) “ that if you honor me with 
your choice, I will strive — to merit” 

“ Go on.” — “ Very good.” — “ Look in the hat again.” 

“ I wish you ’d let my hat alone ; you put me out.” 

“ Put it down then.” — “ Or look into it all the time ; or 
you’ll never get through.” 

“ Our Government, gentlemen, are — no government at all. 
I mean to say, not that they are no government at all, but 
they are only a government that is no government, and ought 
not to govern any longer. So, if you ’ll send me up to the 
House, I will do my best to oppose the Government and 
make the — the Government — do better. I am for Old 
Philautia, gentlemen, as all my fathers were, and mothers, 
and no change. I mean, of course,” ( he smiled himself, ) 
“ except the changes I speak of. That is, I w r ant the Gov- 
ernment to stick by their promises.” — 

“ Will you stick by them, if they do ? ” 

“ No, confound me if I do ! But ” Here a potato was 


OF ALETHITHEE AS. 


235 


thrown into his hat. “ I w T ish you would keep your eatables 
to yourselves ; my hat is n’t a dinner-pot.” 

“ Pity it wa’ n’t.” — “ ’T is n’t half as useful.” — “ His 
brains arc n’t worth a good cabbage.” 

“Perhaps they’re not — to you, if you’re hungry. But 
they are to me ; and if you want them to give tongue, you 
must not put me out in this fashion.” 

“Well-crowed, game un ! ” — “ Cock-e-doodle - doo - ree 
- ah ! ” — “ Better crowed, dunghill ! ” 

“ You won’t let me ” 

“ Read.” — “ He can’t read.” — “ Send him to school.” 

“ I wish you would go yourselves, to learn manners,” said 
the noble. This was received with a laugh. “ Gentlemen, 
I ’m not used to speaking, and — by Jove ! I don’t suppose 
I ever shall be.” — 

“ That ’s honest.” — “ At it again ! ” 

— “ But if you ’ll give me the chance, I’ll vote ; and it 
shall always be — alw T ays be — on the right side, — which 
is my side of course — and yours.” 

He bowed and turned. Just then, a little bag of flour, or 
of lime, was thrown directly at his back, and opening scat- 
tered its contents over him. This was too much for the pa- 
trician’s temper. Facing about angrily, “You are cursedly 

im” he began, when the friend who had presented him 

clapped his hand on his mouth, and turned him back again, 
saying himself, “His lordship desires me to return his 
thanks ” 

“ You be d — d ! ” — “ That ’s no go, old fellow.” Here 
a cabbage-stalk whizzed between the heads of the noble and 
his friend, and striking against the shed found its way into 
the lap of one of the gentlemen seated. The cock crowed 
again, and was followed by the imitator of a yelping dog, bi- 
pedal cats whined an amorous duet, and in the midst of the 
concert the presiding magistrate called a show of hands, and 
the right-honorable candidate was declared elected. 


236 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Pliiletus made no remark, till looking doubtfully on his 
companions he saw that extraordinary nose in motion. “I 
perceive,” he said, “ you are smiling at my idea of Philau- 
tian wisdom and virtue. You did not find them represented 
here.” 

“ The wisdom,” replied Philosc, “ w T as certainly rather pe- 
culiar. For the virtue, we will pass it over as res non judi- 
cata. But I am delighted with the freedom of your elections. 
If their purity be at all commensurate, I shall have to place 
my model here.” 

“These things are managed differently in the great re- 
public ? ” 

“ In Isopoliteia ? O yes. An ass like your patrician legis- 
lator would be hissed down in two minutes — if he ever got 
up to bray. As the president of one of their great railways 
said to me of his growing city in the West : ‘ They may have 
many rogues there ; but there are precious few fools ! ’ ” 

“ But how of the mode of conducting the elections ? That 
was my meaning.” 

“The potatoes, hair-powder, and cabbage-stalks? Were 
these nosegays distributed by the voters here, or non-voters ? ” 

“ By the non-voters, of course.” 

“ So I supposed. They have no non- voters at an election 
in Vesputia.” 

Philetus however was not discouraged, but took the trav- 
elers to another polling-place in another town. Here the dis- 
order was tremendous. It was not merely rotten eggs and 
vegetables, kitchen offal, bags of soot and brickdust and 
lime, that were thrown at the speakers and their friends upon 
the stand, but stones were hurled to and fro in the crowd, 
hats were smashed, sometimes stolen, and heads were broken. 
Become now perfectly lawless, the mob stormed the princi- 
pal hotel. Every wundow in it was smashed to pieces. From 
there they proceeded to private houses. In one of these lay 
a gentleman seriously indisposed. As he could not rise, nor 


237 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 

be removed in time, his attendants held screens before his 
bed against the missiles which in a perfect hailstorm rattled 
through the fractured windows. Not even the churchyard 
was sacred. They tore up the gravestones and scattered 
them, breaking some into pieces which they hurled against 
the windows of the vicarage. The constabulary was power- 
less. Finally the rioters began to assail every well-dressed 
person, and Pliiletus only drew away his friends in time to 
save them and himself from outrage. What was their hor- 
ror however to learn afterwards, that a man for merely shout- 
ing for his favorite candidate was shot deliberately dead in 
the street ! 

Pliiletus was more than mortified. “ We shall hear,” he 
said, “ of scenes like this all over the island. The bad ex- 
ample of this town will not want imitators.” 

“ Bad examples never do, no more than good ones,” said 
Philosc. “ The moral contagion spreads more rapidly than 
that of disease ; for neither mountains nor unnavigable 
streams interrupt its communication.’ ’ 

“I almost fear to ask you again,” resumed Pliiletus. 
“Have they such abominations to dread in Isopoliteia? ” 
“They have had their riots there. A land which lavishes 
its citizenship on foreigners of every kind cannot escape con- 
tamination. These naturalized but never nationalized aliens 
are found the readiest tools of demagogues, who, corrupting 
them, are in turn corrupted by them, as the power to do evil 
safely almost inevitably leads to evil and by its exercise de- 
bauches incurably the evil-doer. Hence ballot-boxes ( for 
they do not vote by voice or hands, you know, as here ) have 
sometimes been broken or carried off, and fights have occur- 
red. But these disorders are rare, and are rendered more un- 
likely of occurrence by the subdivision of the polling-dis- 
tricts, and never occur in country-places like this.” 

“ It is education then that guards the sanctity of popular 
suffrage ? ” 


238 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ Hardly, where the ignorant scum of every people are al- 
lowed to vote. I have but to repeat my former question. 
Are these rioters, do you think, all, or even in great part 
voters ? ” 

“ Scarcely any, if any.” 

“ Then having no interest in the maintenance of order, and 
jealous of the privileges of those who have, what can you 
expect of them ? There would be dissatisfaction were they 
educated, and commotion were they sober ; there is brutality, 
as they are ignorant and drunken.” 

“ I believe you are right. Indeed, it is and has been my 
sentiment, that which you suggest. But it seems to me, that 
disorders have increased since the agitation of the question 
of universal suffrage and partial concessions of reform.” 

“Naturally. You have awakened the sense of the people 
to their wants. If then you but partially gratify them, you 
stimulate an appetite without providing the means for its 
satisfaction. It is not the way to make men moderate or 
humble in their demands, to yield a little as if by compul- 
sion, and a little more as if in fear.” 

Philetus remained for some time thoughtful, with his eyes 
on the ground. “ I must one day visit that great republic in 
Vesputia.” 

“I advise you not,” said Philoscommon, with a silent ob- 
bligato accompaniment of his proboscis. “ If you go there, 
you will go as a Philautian ; when there, you will see, think, 
and act as a Philautian ; and when you come back, it will 
be as a Philautian. Of all the nations of the world, you of 
this island travel most, but of all nations you are the least 
adapted for travel.” 

“ And why so — if indeed it be so ? ” said Philetus, seem- 
ingly a little hurt, — though he did not show it in his tone. 

“ Because of your national bigotry.” 

“ And that is the result of your national greatness and po- 
litical prosperity,” added Alethi amiably. 


OF ALETIHTIIEIIAS, 


239 


“ In great part. I admit it sincerely,” said the schoolmas- 
ter, “ and moreover, that of all men Philetus is most above 
it. But Philetus is still a Philautian.” 

“ Not in the sense you mean,” replied the latter, smiling. — ■ 
“But that will be seen hereafter — should I go to Vesputia.” 
“ Perhaps so,” returned the schoolmaster. 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

They erribarlc for Taprosheo , and come to the Land of 
Hind. What they found there ; with the savory 
discourse of the Schoolmaster thereon. 

It had been our travelers’ intention to visit the northern 
part of the kingdom, and to take a glimpse of Ju verna; but 
a vessel with unusually pleasant accommodations being 
about to sail for the Orient, Alethi, who had expressed him- 
self already weary of Philautia, — whereat the little sage of 
Medamou made sundry movements both of face and body, 
indicative of mirth and of that satisfaction which arises from 
the realization of one’s prognostics, — declared that if his 
companion had no objection to cut short his studies, he 
would go to Taprosheo. 

M None in the world,” said the philosopher. “ But you will 
not lose sight of Philautia there.” 

“ Then we "will leave it all the sooner,” said Alethitheras. 

“So be it,” said Philoscommon. And he -went to secure 
their passage. 

The voyage was marked by no incident worth recording. 
The passengers amused themselves as usual, by standing on 
their heads ; and Philoscommon gratified himself and enter- 
tained his companion by measuring, as he said, “ the breadth 
of their souls ” when in that position. 


240 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

They approached the Land of Hind. 

“ This vast and varied country,” said the schoolmaster, “ was 
once regarded as the Paradise of Earth. But the weakness, 
the ambitious rivalry, the despotism of its rulers, its misera- 
ble religion, its degraded and for the most part effeminate 
people, have combined to make it the prey of nations foreign 
to it, till the greediest and most determined of them all has 
swallowed up, province by province and kingdom after king- 
dom, almost the whole of its immense empire. But with 
the nearly million square miles of ravished territory, gained 
by fraud and force of arms, by force of arms made necessary 
by fraud ” 

“ You speak of Philautia ?” 

“ Of what Power else ? Do you remember the maxim of 
the (Ebalian, that the skin of the lion must be eked out 
with the tail of the fox ? Perfidious, double-dealing, and 
ambitious like him, Philautia uses craft to aid her valor, and 
fights, a lion, the battles brought upon her by her subtle 
thieving as a fox. But with her acquisitions comes anxiety. 
As she strides upward and onward, she approaches nearer to 
Sursia, whose enormous dominions in the East spread not 
less surely, though more slowly, than her own. Look yonder, 
where I stretch my arm. There, where the sun will rise to- 
morrow on the oldest kingdom of the earth, the Sursian 
is encroaching. Piece by piece, by politic negotiation and 
by purchase, you see him pressing nearer to his rival's 
eastern confines, while from the north and on the west his 
tread is quite as steady downward and in advance. How 
you understand one reason of that war between them; nor 
will you think a waste of means and courage the gallant de- 
fence of that border fortress whose surrender, though it was 
no disgrace, was deemed such by Philautia, unaccustomed 
to be beaten. Yonder, in the north-west, is that Sea which 
by a graceful euphemism was known as the Hospitable. 
Mistress of that and with free access downward to the Mid- 


OF ALETHITHEllAS. 


241 


land Sea, the Osman Power broken up, you see the fatal time 
would be accelerated when the battle must be to decide 
which of the two shall have the whole. It is easy to see it 
will not be Philautia.” 

“ And will that suit you ? ” 

“ Yes. It would be the merited punishment of her ava- 
rice and bloody ambition ; the atonement exacted by Destiny, 
that she should win all here for another, precisely as others 
won here all for her.” 

They arrived at a critical period. A large part of the 
country was in open revolt, and the Philautians were putting 
down the insurrection by the promptest and most violent 
means. 

In a few months, the travelers became perfectly familiar 
with the situation, aided thereto partly by Philoscommon’s 
previous knowledge, and partly by the acquaintance they had 
formed with a Juvernan surgeon, for some years resident in 
those parts. 

A powerful trading-company, whose whole object was 
gain, was not likely to regard the rights of a people to 
whom they considered themselves in every respect superior. 
When with successful encroachment came the lust of terri- 
tory, the home Government found it to their interest to abet 
them in their fraudulent negotiations and to defend them 
against the consequences of their unprincipled invasions. 
Gaining permission to garrison their settlements, insidiously 
aiding one native despot against another, and obtaining for 
their services whole provinces in concession, the Philautians 
added another means of extending and strengthening the 
grasp of their ambition : they sowed dissatisfaction, and 
gathered dexterously the fruits of revolt against their own 
oppression. A fresh instance of this old-time policy was 
related by the surgeon. The King of Ayodhya', dispossessed 
of the greater part of his kingdom by these conquerors, had 
become their tributary for the rest. It was a state of things 
11 


242 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


that admitted of improvement. It was folly to be satisfied 
with two thirds when the whole could be had on easy terms. 
The king was found to be unfit to rule ; he was given to 
ignoble pleasures, and indulged in tricks of childish mis- 
chief. The political critics in the great quarter-yearly jour- 
nals of Philautia wondered why he should be suffered on the 
throne so long. They deplored, like humane men, the neces- 
sity of his deposition, but, in the interests of humanity, 
should the supposed rights of such a puppet be considered ? 
If he were only to attempt to throw off his allegiance ! So 
his family were made to be involved in the general conspir- 
acy against their foreign masters. His two eldest sons, as 
likely to be some day troublesome, were taken away in a car- 
riage by a Philautian officer, stood up against a wall and 
without other preparation shot dead by the officer’s own 
hand ; but the imbecile monarch, now in his eighty-fourth 
year, after undergoing every indignity, including a revolting 
pseudo-trial, was spared as harmless, to become probably for 
the short term of his remaining life a stipendiary of the 
Philautian crown. 

Philoscommon was seated, or rather squatted, with Ale- 
tliitheras, in the verandah of their lodgings at Palibothra, 
with his box of betel by him ; for he had become as one of 
the land in this and some other respects, smoking too on 
occasion a pompously-coiled hucah, and regretting that he 
could not go partially naked because of his peculiar figure, 
but advising his companion to turn gymnosophist, predict- 
ing for him in that event a sensation, with his white skin 
and fleshy limbs, among the sun-dyed maidens. He had 
succeeded however in making him recline at times after the 
fashion of the country, with his seat upon a rug and his 
elbow on a bolster. As they lounged thus, enjoying the 
voluptuous air, 

“ I wonder,” said the little sage, taking up his pinch of 
betel, the accompanying lime and bit of arreca-nut, “ that 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


243 


you will not try these leaves. They are a good stomachic, 
TLethi.” 

“But I have no stomach for them.” 

“ And they are aphrodisiac — like all the pepper-kind. 
So perhaps you are wise to eschew and not to chew them, 
being given to Minnchens; of whom there are a sufficient 
number among these yellow damsels. But for me,” he said 
with a sigh, and proceeding to masticate, “ my susceptibility 
that way all died out with my steeple-chase. But what 
makes you so serious ? ” 

“ I am thinking of that miserable nawaub.” 

“ And his unfortunate sons. Bah ! they are not worth it. 
They were but coppercolored heathens. Why one such peb- 
ble as the invaders ravished from a manlier despot in the 
mountains yonder,” ( he waved his little arm to the north- 
west, ) “was worth a dozen such lives. You remember the 
big thing. They called it — after the extravagant oriental 
fancy, as if it were a crystal sun — by a grandiloquent 
poetic name, though you and I could see no poetry in it and 
but little brightness. But that was not our fault, and it cost 
the polisher his head. Think of its estimate in untranspar- 
ent cash, and don’t expect the winners of such prizes in 
kingdoms or diamonds to be over-scrupulous as to how they 
came by them.” 

“ Don’t jest, Philos'. It was a damnable act.” 

“ And so it was, Alethi. Of course, the kings of this coun- 
try are not all like the model one depicted by Philostratus, 
and never have been. If one such were found in one hun- 
dred generations, it would be honor enough to the country 
that produced him, and to the customs which made his mode 
of life possible. But if every sovereign in this vast empire 
were ten times more effeminate than the most voluptuous of 
those other princes whom the same biographer has set in 
contrast, it would not authorize their supersedure by a for- 
eign Power. If vice, effeminacy, idle living, and the squan- 


244 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


dering of treasure would justify such interference, then could 
the action be reversed, and Ayodhya' might have dethroned 
the last king but one of Philautia, whose sole claim to dis- 
tinction was that he was said by his sycophants to carry 
further than anybody else the artificial manners which earn 
with his people the title of well-bred. But the difference is, 
that the strength for subversion lay with Philautia and the 
proneness for subjection with this gentle and mostly unwar- 
like race, the cause for whose enslavement was that very 
inoffensiveness which should have made them be let alone.” 

“ I remember that delightful picture of Phraortes and the 
sage. It doubtless was embellished, but the kingly proto- 
type could not have been found among a barbarous people.” 

“ No, not barbarous. Here has been said to be the cradle 
of religion, and it may be added, that of philosophy and of 
perhaps the arts and sciences. But all these offspring of the 
human intellect have remained here in the cradle, and will 
there remain forever, unless the native races be changed or 
wholly superseded. The doctrines of the immortality of the 
soul and a state of future reward and punishment had here 
probably their origin. Pantheism also is with some of their 
philosophers an ancient fancy ; and there are some who teach 
the more rational hypothesis, that the world created was left 
to govern itself by laws set upon it at the dawn of its crea- 
tion.” 

“ Then these people preceded the western races in the very 
paths of metaphysical investigation which the latter sup- 
posed had been opened solely by themselves ? ” 

“ No. As I have said, they are but children, even their 
philosophers, and never will be more. The idea of the im- 
perishable nature of the human soul would require no long 
age of civilization, notwithstanding a prominent example to 
the contrary, and the thought of a state of future rewards 
and punishments would easily occur in its train. Pantheism, 
and the belief in a creating but not continually directing 


OF ALKTHITIIEEAS, 


245 


Providence, are not indeed so simple inferences from the at- 
tributes and fortunes of humanity and the circumstances that 
surround and control it, but they might readily be formed 
as opinions by any man of a thoughtful and speculative 
turn of mind, and would be at once received as dogmas by 
many thinkers who adopt their faith at secondhand. Take 
for example the fortunes of that powerful emperor in this 
•country, who, treacherous, crafty, hypocritical, and remorse- 
less, managed to destroy his own brothers, and mounting the 
throne lived prosperous till eighty-nine years old, a good 
monarch, an impartial judge and a generous patron of learn- 
ing. What must be the suggestion to the mind of a thought- 
ful and just man who compares the almost unbroken success 
of this usurper with the melancholy fate of his virtuous, 
noble and lovely eldest brother, whom he circumvented and 
put to death ? As for the prevailing belief of these people 
in a transmigration of the soul, I think too it is a perfectly 
natural one, and naturally accompanies in an early stage of 
civilization a conception of the soul’s immortality. Have 
you never yourself been tempted to think for a moment that 
certain animals might possibly be but other forms of some 
human individuals departed from their human life ? ” 

“ I don’t know but I have. But I do not think the idea 
would have occurred without my previous knowledge that 
there was such a notion.” 

“ I think it would, to you and to thousands. The Anthe- 
musian adopted it hence because he found it here taught as a 
dogma, but, comparing the propensities of animals with those 
of men, he could not have looked into their eyes or watched 
intelligently their ways, without fancying that they might 
possibly be animated with the same spirit. That it is car- 
ried here to such an absurd excess as you have often seen it 
is not more ridiculous than the superstitions of nations more 
enlightened and of a loftier faith. In Tursa they have a 
hospital where not merely the infirm and old of larger crea- 


246 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


tures are maintained, but insects, and it is said that they hire 
some pauper occasionally to submit himself ( strapped down 
to his bargain you may be sure ) to the bites of bugs and 
fleas.” 

“ It would have been a good idea for the lazaret.” 

“ Before we entered it. Ay, such vicarious sacrifice would 
have saved your night-shirt. I see you now holding it. 
What a figure you cut, to be sure ! till you cut out, to be 
bitten worse by a tarentula in petticoats.” 

“ You have strayed from your subject, Mehetabel’s man.” 

“ Thank your reminder. Yes, from religion to love. It is 
natural and common; as is also a devagation from love to 
religion. Let us make the latter, as do certain ladies past 
their prime, and return. I said, Alethi, that the supersti- 
tions of these turbaned tawney folk are not more ridiculous 
than those of nations which pity them contemptuously as 
pagans, and have a horror of all idolatry, but their own, 
from Priapus to the lingain. In this sacred city, the monarch 
of woi'shiped places , whose environs for more than a day’s 
journey are holy ground, and wherein to die is to merit, if 
not a heavenly paradise, at least a perfect fruition of the 
heart’s desires in the next form of existence, you may count 
at times a hundred thousand pilgrims. Have not the Sala- 
mans, who despise these idolaters, their own sacred travels, 
and over desert sands where thousands of them perish ? Was 
there never a crusade ? You have lately seen penitents in 
constrained positions which they keep immovably till death. 
Was there not a Jesousian Saint who made it a merit to 
live on the narrow top of a pillar ? Is it more absurd, if 
more painful, to wriggle on one’s back from temple to tem- 
ple than to crawl on one’s knees up a temple’s steps ? At the 
Festival of the Gar hundreds have fallen under the wheels of 
the huge machine ; but they were self-immolated. Here, in 
this semi-barbarous country, no man has yet been roasted by 
an Act of Faith. In the putschay , the god is expected to pre- 


OP ALETIITHEEAS. 


247 


. sent himself to the adoring priest in a bucket of water, as 
one of the gods of their trinity by like prayer is incorpor- 
ated with his favorite image, in the little water-rounded lin- 
gams of the giant Vanajuren. Does not that remind you of 
something in the countries we have visited ? The chamber 
where the transubstantiation takes place is sprinkled pre- 
viously with cow’s urine. Is the aqua lustralis any better ? ” 

“ I should think it was.” 

“ In one sense certainly,” said the little sage, agitating his 
proboscis. “ But I meant in efficacy. And when the simple 
offerings are made, of the fruits of the earth, not forgetting the 
inevitable betel, the flattered deity is expected to return the 
favor a hundred fold. This is the thrifty calculation of relig- 
ious worship everywhere. The prayers of men are almost in- 
variably, except perhaps with a few extraordinary beings, 
profoundly selfish. They adore for present benefit or for fu- 
ture immunity ; and the happiness which they feel in the 
performance of a day’s devotion arises from the thought that 
they have entered a valuable additional item to their side of 
the sheet in the account-books of Heaven.” 

“ O Philos' ! ” 

“ O Philos' ! How often I make you exclaim thus. Can- 
not you yet bear to hear the plain truth, because nobody else 
but I dares talk it to you ? I do not argue against religious 
worship. God forbid ! God does forbid. What have I had 
often in my physical and other inflictions to console me but 
Let us pass over that, or you will think me too a hypo- 
crite. Don’t interrupt me with contradictions ! or I shall never 
finish, — which I will now do in few words. Look everywhere 
into religion. Its propagation and maintenance (except al- 
ways, remember, with the lofty and pure minded, and the 
devout of heart) are effected by taking advantage of human 
fears and human helplessness. What does even the Leipoder- 
mian Psalmist pray for? Is it to glorify Jehovah, to exult in 
His beneficence as seen in creation and to extol His attributes 


248 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


as manifested in all things visible ? This is but rarely done, 
and when done it is but the prelude or the accompaniment 
to supplication for the overthrow of his enemies, or for the 
alleviation of physical ills which his conscience told him 
were the consequences of his voluptuousness. About four 
hundred years ago, the King of Alectoreion, and about a 
hundred years later his fellow of Jactantia, thought to atone 
for all their cruelties and persistent wrong-doing by outward 
sanctity ; and when the latter slaughtered thousands in the 
name of the All-Merciful One, he hoped to be rewarded for it.” 

“ By the by, I have often wished to ask, how do you ac- 
count for such hallucinations on the part of men not defi- 
cient in sagacity ? ” 

“ But often unusually gifted with it. Plainly, Alethi, by 
this fact, that man in his egotism paints the Godhead after 
his own likeness. He ascribes to the Impassible passion like 
his own, to the Impeccable weakness, to the Omniscient and 
Omnituent shortsightedness and partial observation, and to 
the Creator of All Things a susceptibility to be bribed by 
what is of His own production.” 

“ But is not the spirit of devotion natural to some men ? ” 

“ Demonstrably so, as well as the want of it. The virtuous 
of soul who have this inborn piety are never hypocrites, the 
vicious under like circumstances always are. Their hypoc- 
risy is the politic employment of a means for which they 
have an innate and irresistible predeliction. This w*as the 
case with the two Jesousian kings alluded to. The Salaman 
emperor who made his way to his father’s throne over the 
bodies of his elder brothers, had probably no impulse to re- 
ligious zeal, but feigned it as the readiest means to conceal 
at once and further his ambition.” 

“ You have said that this land was the cradle of Religion ; 
and further, that Religion here remains a child. How is it 
then that it evinces none of the simplicity of childhood ? ” 
“ It does in one sense ; for its nurses have put toys into its 


OF ALETHITHERAS, 


249 


hands, which amuse it to the exclusion of real things, and 
confine its observation to trifles. If you- mean its artless 
freshness and unsophisticated modes, the reason is the same 
as that of the corruption of all religions, which come from 
the hands of God naked and beautiful, but priestcraft covers 
them with false finery, and distorts their proportions and de- 
stroys their unity for its selfish purposes. Under the idea 
that the people would better understand the attributes 
of the deity by seeing them personified and symboled, the 
jwiests of this country, as in others of the East, made them 
idols and invented fables: and the result has been that the 
symbol is worshiped to the exclusion of the essence it rep- 
resents and the fables are become the foundation of the tenets 
of their faith. You know that this is done too in the West, 
and with a like result. I reminded you of the self-torturing 
devotees whom you have seen here with disgust as well as 
pity. They but represent a religious perversion of the spe- 
cious philosophy which distinguished the Gymnosophists. 
These men inculcated a life of virtuous contemplation, — an 
impossibility by the by as well as a self-contradiction, since 
virtue can never be negative, and to be good one must do 
something more than ponder goodness. They made the two 
names of these vagabond monks, implying a renunciation 
of the world and the practice of devotion, to be synony- 
mous, and the morality they inculcated is the same as has 
made the reputation of many of the so-called wise-men or 
wisdom-lovers, but really pretenders to wisdom, of ancient 
Hellas. But they prescribed too the outward inode of the 
practice of meditation ; to keep, namely, the body motion- 
less, its muscles unrelaxed, and the eyes fixed upon the ex- 
tremity of the nose. So by a natural consequence, as in 
religion, the devotees confined their observances to the forms 
alone, and sat or stood like statues, looking cross-eyed at the 
tip or but-end of their smellers, like the fools, or impostors, 
if not often villains, that they were and they are.” 

11 * 


250 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER XXXYI. 

Wherein the travelers have hared to them the beauties of 
Philautian humanity in the Land of Hind . 

At this point in the conversation, Crymoker, the surgeon, 
who had accompanied them to Palibothra, came out into the 
verandah. 

He was a middle-aged man of medium height, well-set, but 
spare, and of a sharp oval visage whose dark thick skin had 
a singularly cold look, as had his large black eyes and well- 
formed but colorless lips. He declined gravely the betel 
which Philoscommon offered him not gravely, but took the 
liucah which the huca-berdar brought after him, and dis- 
daining both chair and cushion, perched himself with one 
leg on the rail of the balustrade and his back against a pil- 
lar, and prepared to smoke. 

“ Pray go on,” he said. “ What were you talking about ? ” 

“ De omnibus rebus et quibusdam aliisf replied the school- 
master. “ Philosophy and religion, with an episode on love 
apropos of the Hospital for Invalid Animals and Alethi’s 
night-sliirl ; the whole preceded by Philautian apantliropy 
and the King of Ayodhya', whom our friend finds very much 
to be pitied.” 

u So do I,” said the Doctor, puffing calmly. 

“ Why, of the whole four-and-twenty of his family who 
were executed, over and above his sons, there was not one 
real white man ! ” 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


251 


“ There were some of them who were whiter than I am,” 
esicl the Doctor. 

“Ah, that you will say so, Doctor!” replied Philos'. 
“Yours is merely a darker shade among light skins, theirs 
were lighter ones among dark. I wonder you will not see 
the distinction. A mere difference of color in the rete muco- 
sum , when it is one of race, will make men so reckless of life 
in those who betray it, that they will slaughter them without 
more compunction than wild animals, — though they have 
no right to do either without necessity. You have seen such 
grand examples of it in this rebellion, that I should think 
you would be used to it by this time. How many did you 
say were put to death in cold blood in this one city alone, by 
the Pliilautians ? ” 

“ Thirteen hundred.” 

“ And how many in the Country of the Five Rivers ? ” 

“ I ive thousand.” 

“ Are you sure of that, Doctor ? ” said Alethi. 

“ It was so stated in a letter from the Philautian comman- 
der himself.” 

“ But under what plea was such horrible butchery ? ” 

“ Under the tyrant's plea , necessity. They call this a mili- 
tary mutiny, yet the whole country is more or less turned up 
with revolution. Recollect with what difficulty we made 
our way hither. It would have been perhaps impossible 
without the troops. The people are so infuriated by the can- 
non-shooting and the hanging, that nothing but terrorism 
fan keep them down. That is, they say so. I have my own 
opinion.” And the Doctor drew a long draught of smoke. 
“ At a recent execution of many native soldiers, some even 
of their former comrades, who were forced to witness it, are 
said to have cried out, ‘Die like men. You but defended 
your religion.’ ” 

“ Whether that is true or not,” remarked the schoolmaster, 
“ it is not likely that the populace could turn away from 


252 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


such a bloody spectacle, where some of their countrymen 
were deliberately scattered to the wind by grapeshot, while 
others dangled in it at a rope's end, without rage in their 
hearts and the desire of revenge. They knew that a like 
scene was enacted in a dozen places, that villages were fired 
where not a man perhaps had aught to do with the uprising, 
and they had brains enough to estimate the injustice of such 
indiscrimate punishment and its atrocious severity. Is it to 
be wondered at, if under such provocation they assassinate 
every white man they meet upon the road.” 

“ But that they do so,” resumed the Doctor, “is why we 
— no, I am not a Philautian, thank my father ! why they , 
the Jesousian masters, assassinate in turn. Only, these do it 
by wholesale. Upon the mere report of fugitives from Ind- 
raput — who under the circumstances would not be likely 
to be very truthful, even if men never lied against their 
enemies, — on the exaggerated, if not wholly fictitious state- 
ments of these terrified runaways, ‘ we immediately,’ writes a 
Philautian, ‘set on fire five villages of the natives and hung 
up every one that fell into our hands.’ ” 

Philoscommon turned his face with a peculiar expression 
on Alethi, whose eyes looked very large and bright as he 
said to Crymoker, “ You make me almost doubt a God, where 
such devils are permitted to rage with impunity.” 

“ As these Philautians,” adds the surgeon drily. “ But 
they say that a woman among the fugitives was stripped, 
mishandled, had her breasts cut off, and then murdered, and 
another was served the same way under a bridge.” 

“As if such things,” said Philoscommon, “were never done 
by the Philautians themselves, and not in two instances, but 
in hundreds. A grayhaired captain of the Philautian Royal 
Engineers, who was at the taking of a city famous for its 
siege in Jactantia, told me himself, that he entered a room 
where he found a man held by the arms by two Philautian 
soldiers, and actually frothing at the mouth with impotent 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


253 


rage, while a third was dishonoring his daughter before his 
very eyes.” 

“ But the writer adds,” continued the Doctor in the same 
cold, dry tone, “ ‘ We found a pair of child’s shoes in which 
were yet sticking the little feet of a seven years’ child.’ ” 

“ How could they tell its particular age by the feet ? ” asked 
Philoscommon. 

“ That is not in anatomy,” replied the Doctor, “ but it 
must be fact, because the writer says in connection, ‘We 
hanged all the native scoundrels that we found on the way.’ ” 

“How did they know they were scoundrels?” persisted 
Philoscommon. 

“ Because a man, who was at the last massacre in Indraput, 

said Of course he could not speak but truth. What 

temptation had he to falsify, or to exaggerate ? ” pursued 
the Doctor, with the same singular contrast of a cold, emo- 
tionless tone and animated words. “ It was not in human 
nature to invent such acts, even if it were common for men 
to magnify their stories for the sake of exciting wonder or 
eliciting attention, or gratifying spite. This apostle said, 
‘ that little children were tossed into the air and caught upon 
the points of bayonets.’ So you see that where such is the 
amusement of a soldiery- when their destructive propensities 
are roused, the whole people must necessarily be scoundrels.” 

“ It is a good argument,” quoth the schoolmaster. “ So, 
as there are women in Philautia who practice as a, business 
child-murder, and as a woman was there found who poisoned 
eight infants of her own bearing by drugging her nipples, 
the entire nation of Philautians deserve extermination in this 
world and damnation in the next.” 

“ Prdbatum est ,” said the Doctor. “ But, in your own 
words, I wonder you will not see a distinction. These were 
miserable yellow devils, or brown. It would not do even for 
Philautians to chain white folk to cannon and blow them to 
atoms, or hang them by hundreds for mere rebellion. They 


254 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


did however in one instance show no regard to color ; a Phil- 
autian was found among the insurgents pointing the cannon. 
He was taken and ‘ hewed to pieces.’ There is no rage like 
the fury of disappointed pride.” 

“ And no cruelty like that directed by the selfishness of 
fear. The Pliilautians in the overweening confidence of 
their superiority had entrusted the garrison of their strongest 
post to native troops. They did not believe that worms 
would dare to rise when the foot that trampled them was 
such as theirs ; and when the rebellion spread, like fire in a 
forest, and the powerful of the land even to the kings of the 
ancient soubalis were involved in the conflagration, though 
the usurers called it a mutiny, they saw their w r hole em- 
pire threatened -with destruction, and, with the vindictive 
yet timorous haste of tyrants, took to the tyrant’s mode, and 
poured blood upon the flames.” 

“ Yes, this was the mode of the great Conqueror of our cen- 
tury, whom they used to execrate,” said the Doctor quietly. 

‘ Bum,’ was his order on the occasion of an insignificant up- 
rising in Anastasia, ‘ Burn one or two large villages, and let 

not one of them be left Pardon no one, but shoot 

at least six hundred of the revolted .... Disarm all the 
inhabitants, and give up to pillage five or six large villages 
of the most unruly.’ ” 

“Yes, I remember,” rejoined the schoolmaster, “he avowed, 
on the same occasion, a desire for an uprising in ParthenopS, 
considering a revolt among a conquered people as necessary 
to complete their subjugation. I predict, that you will find 
some day, if you stay here, the Philautian journals thanking 
God for the mutiny ; for the rebellion is too ill-organized 
not to be put down ; and the Philautian empire in this vast 
country will be thereby consolidated, as it is already by the 
same means extended.” 

Alethitheras, who had appeared very thoughtful during 
this dialogue, now, addressing Philoscommon, said : “ As- 


OP ALETIIITHERAS, 


255 


snming this revolt to be a popular rebellion, and not a mili- 
tary mutiny under the pretext of an insult to their religious 
prejudices, had this people a right to rebel ? ” 

“ Beyond any doubt,” replied the schoolmaster. “ Mere 
conquest can give no right which cannot be set aside by 
counter-conquest. All our sympathies must necessarily be on 
the side of those who rise against a yoke which was put upon 
them, not accepted.” 

The Juveman doctor half-inclined his head over the stem 
of his hucah, but his eyes, which were fixed steadily on Phil- 
oscommon, looked cold as before: and Alethi, no longer 
leaning on his cushion, resumed : 

‘‘Were I a Philautian, it seems to me that I should be 
ashamed to walk the streets of those great cities which had 
come into the possession of my country only by violence su- 
peradded to and in maintenance of fraud, and whose posses- 
sion is maintained only by the presence of an armed power. 
I should feel as the compatriot and accessory of robbers, and 
every native I met would seem to reproach me for his subjec- 
tion and his country’s ruin.” 

“ No,” said Philoscommon, “ you feel that now. But were 
you a Philautian, the chances are that you would forget all 
the wrong and all the violence in the glory attached to their 
success.” 

“ Would Philetus, think you ? ” 

“ Well, perhaps there might be an exception in Philetus and 
in yon. But you are phoenixes. And I would not swear that 
even your feathers would not change in the situation. Vanity 
is a sore tempter and perverter, Alethi ; and to be a Philau- 
tian, yet cast off as false ornament all that ministers to that 
vanity in the so-called glory of Philautian conquest, is to be 
something more than an ordinary mortal. It is to be of Me- 
damou.” 

The doctor, beckoning to the huca-berdar, resigned his 
pipe, then taking a pinch of betel, he said: “We are all 


256 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


agreed, it seems, as to tlie barbarity of the treatment of the 
insurgents. As to its policy, that is another question. But 
it is one thing to picture these things to ourselves when re- 
lated, another to see them : and it is only by seeing we can 
judge. To-morrow we shall have an opportunity. Ten men 
are to be hung, three shot by musketry, and five blown from 
the mouths of cannon. — I see,” he continued, looking calm- 
ly at Alethi, whose countenance manifested surprise not un- 
mingled with disgust, “you think it w T ould be 'monstrous to 
witness what will have a thousand spectators. The Pliilau- 
tians have no objection to extend the force of the example, 
and make all welcome to see the show.” 

“The example is not for us; and I slia’ n’t go.” 

“ Why not, Alethi ? ” said the schoolmaster. 

“ Is it necessary that I should see men torn to pieces, to 
know the effects of grapeshot and cannon-powder ? ” 

“ Yes, as an instrument of military discipline. As Crymo- 
ker says, we are all agreed as to the barbarity of the act. 
But are we sure that we are right ? And have we not come 
hither, as we have traveled and shall travel elsewhere, to see 
what is to be seen of human customs and of human actions. 
To know how the condemned will meet their fate, and to see 
what is the nature of that fate in all its horrors, is, I think, 
for once, and with our special motives, not to be denied 
us.” 

Despite of his generous disposition, a feeling of curiosity 
began to struggle in Alethi's breast, which he himself per- 
haps mistook for his usual readiness to sacrifice his inclina- 
tions to those of others, but which the clear cold eyes of the 
surgeon seemed to penetrate and Philoscommon perfectly 

understood. “ If I thought you greatly cared, Philos' 

Cannot you go without me ? ” 

“ No, I should go in fact for you. To experience the in- 
tensity of horror is something, when the nerves will bear the 
shock ; and the moral effects in one’s own nature of such a 


OF ALETHIT1IERA8, 


257 


shock are worth ascertaining. You are young ; and it is but 
for once. — What time, Crymoker, will it be ? ” 

“ Ea'rly in the morning. We must start by daylight.” 

“I will order all things accordingly. You will go this 
time to oblige me, as you have often done before, Aletlii ; 
and I shall go I believe to instruct you, which you know is 
my self-imposed duty.” As he said this, the little man could 
not resist making one of his contortions. 

“ And on the w T hole,” said the surgeon quietly, getting 
down from his perch while his companions left their rugs, 
“ the same natural feeling which gives us zest for the death- 
scenes of a represented tragedy or the recorded horrors of 
extraordinary crimes, must be allowed to prompt us here. 
The fascination of horror is a mere truism. Whatever hyp- 
ocrites may say, the human mind craves its excitement as the 
human blood its stimulus, and whether the gratification be 
sought in contemplated agony or in bad whiskey, the impel- 
ling motive is the same.” 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 

They Disit a field of blood and learn the Philautian state- 
logic of grapesliot and gunpowder. 

On their way to the fatal place, there was at first complete 
silence. When it was broken, Crymoker, in his customary 
cold calm tone, yet wfith sufficiently animated words, related 
several special instances of the barbarous vengeance of the 
Philautians, who in their fury seemed at times to have made 
no discrimination between those who were faithful to them 
and those who -were not. 

“ Indeed in some cases,” pursued the Doctor, “ men were 
shot and were hanged who had actually at peril of their own 


258 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


lives saved tlie lives of Philautians. Had they aided the in- 
surgents, had they not aided, it was enough if they refused 
to fight against them, they were strung by the neck or had 
their brains blown out all the same, — though the mere fact 
that they had rescued from death certain of their conquer- 
ors should have availed at least in mitigation of their pun- 
ishment, even had they been taken in actual rebellion. Here 
is a fact which comes fresh from the family of an officer who, 
with his brother-officers, was saved with great difficulty dur- 
ing the mutiny of one of the contingents. They were two 
hundred in number, the men who had acted thus generously, 
and they had refused to go with the mutineers. Yet these 
two hundred men were everyone of them put to death, on 
the ground that they had not taken part against their own 
brethren.” 

“ And are these facts generally known ? ” asked Philoscom- 
mon. 

“ This particular butchery was related in the popular legis- 
lative body of Philautia, and a member of that body com- 
mented on it afterward in proper terms, to his constituents.” 

“ With what result ? ” said Aletlii eagerly. 

“ They cried, Shame ! shame ! — and forgot it.” 

“You will make me wish the condemned and their judges 
were now to change places, if you tell much more,” said 
Aletlii. 

* “ What then will you say to this ? ” pursued the surgeon 
in the same tranquil unelevated tone. “ A. letter from a sol- 
dier tells, how, after one of these wholesale executions of 
their prisoners, his comrades flung the bodies pell-mell into 
a pit, without examining if they were lifeless or not. One 
of them recovering came back to the camp. What do you 
suppose they did with him ? ” 

“ Shot him again,” said Philoscommon. 

“ The very next morning,” rejoined the surgeon. 

“ God of justice ! of compassion ! ” cried Aletlii. 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


259 


‘‘His creatures practice neither,” said the surgeon, — “ not 
toward men of a different color, as your friend has taught 
me. In every direction, wherever the telegraph was found 
broken around Indraput, there the head men of the place 
were hanged, without a particle of evidence against them. 
They were in fact as innocent of the injury as you or I.” 

“ It was simple murder,” said Alethi. 

“ No, compound,” quoth Philos'. 

“And it was so pronounced in the assembly,” rejoined the 
Surgeon. “ But what avail the protests, or the indignation 
and disgust" of one or two right-thinking and true-speaking 
Philautians? The deed will be repeated to-morrow, if 
thought politic, or a dyspeptic general should so order.” 

“ As we shall be convinced to-day,” added Pliiloscommon. 

There was again a long silence. The interior of the ve- 
hicle, which had hitherto been dimly lighted only by the 
lantern in front, was now more visible by the advancing 
dawn, whose gray light began to reveal distinctly the mov- 
ing groups of people on both sides and the separate vehicles 
native and foreign which were pressing onward, all bound 
to the same field of terror and blood. It was the surgeon 
who resumed the conversation, addressing himself to Philos- 
common. 

“ You alluded yesterday to child-murder in Philautia, and 
to the particular act of one woman who had poisoned her 
nipples. Did you know there is a tribe, in the flat penin- 
sula across the country to the southwest of us, with whom 
the female children were almost invariably destroyed, and in 
that very manner, till the Philautians, through one brave 
man, interfered, and gradually induced them to abandon the 
practice, at least as a custom of the people? They used 
opium for the poison, and the infants thus destroyed were 
said figuratively to be drowned in milky 

“ The practice, however horrible, does not surprise me,” 
replied the schoolmaster. “Among a barbarous people, 


260 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


women would naturally be looked upon merely as the agents 
of reproduction, and a limited number would suffice. The 
males, as a source of strength, and as capable of self-sup- 
port while incapable in themselves of adding to the numbers 
of the tribe, would be regarded as an addition to their re- 
sources. When too it is in a warlike race, as in the instance 
you mention, you see a reason the more. I need not remind 
either of you of the custom of the Laconians instituted by 
their great and virtuous lawgiver, nor of the superstitious 
sacrifices of children which prevailed among so many heathen 
nations.” 

“In more than those,” interrupted the surgeon. You are 
familiar, I suppose, with the books ascribed to the Hebrew 
lawgiver and reformer. When Abraham was about to offer 
up Isaac, he was probably but following a familiar practice 
of his time. David sings lamentingly, that the children of 
Israel in Canaan offered up their sons and daughters in sac- 
rifice.” 

“ That was in the time of Moses,” resumed Philoscommon. 
“ Later in the world, you read in Hebrew Scripture of the 
King of Moab’s sacrificing his own son. There too is the af- 
fecting story of Jeplithali. And I need not instance, in a 
classic historian, the two hundred children sacrificed at one 
offering by the great rival and enemy of Ariospolis. The 
number may be exaggerated, but of the nature of the sacri- 
fice there can be no doubt, for we know what was done by 
the father of the renowned general of that people. Some of 
the heathen ancestors of the Philautians were guilty of a like 
selfish cruelty. To avert disaster or to express gratitude for 
success, men offer up what is most precious — provided it be 
not themselves. Precisely so, to rid themselves of inconveni- 
ence savage nations in many parts of the now known world 
2>ut out of existence their newborn offspring without more 
remorse, perhaps emotion of any kind, than we should feel 
in destroying vermin. In Serica the poorer people in large 


OP ALE THITHER AS. 


281 


numbers are said to suffocate tlieir female children in a basin 
of water, or expose them by night in the open streets, and the 
government, which must be conscious of the practice, is sup- 
posed to wink at it. This is at least a negative encourage- 
ment, especially if it be true that the authorities in the capi- 
tal have every morning the exposed infants, dead and dying, 
carted away and thrown without examination into a pit ; al- 
though it is asserted, on the other hand, that they rescue 
those which are found living and bring them up at the pub- 
lic expense.” 

“ Then,” observed Alethi, “ as your words imply that it is 
even there looked upon as a crime, it can only be the desper- 
ately indigent or the most abandoned of females who can so 
forget the feelings and the claims of maternity.” 

“ It may not be the females who do it,” replied the school- 
master, — “ although, myself, I do not see why not. It is 
among the false lessons taught by a theoretical philosophy — 
I mean to say a philosophy which bases its inductions, not 
upon facts, but upon certain opinions which it derives from 
hypothesis or from partial observation ; it is, I say, among 
one of its false lessons, the doctrine of the innate love of 
women for their offspring. In the dumb animals nature has 
provided an impulse of attachment which lasts so long as it 
is needful for the young, but no longer ; but it is not constant 
even with them. Swine have been known to devour their 
brood, and those who are familiar with the ways of dogs will 
tell you that there is a great difference in the degree of ma- 
ternal tenderness among different females of even the same 
species. In human beings certain motives, and certain calcu- 
lations, of economy, of shame, of convenience even, are per- 
petually operating which cannot affect the brutes, and any 
one of these calculations is enough in a very great number of 
women everywhere to overpower maternal affection, supposing 
such a thing to exist in all cases, which I do not believe. 
Certain advertisements of female-remedies, so-called, point to 


262 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


practices which are scarcely equivocal. And when I tell you 
that these advertisements abound in Isopoliteia, you will see 
that it cannot be despair of resources for the support of off- 
spring which usually prompts to this atrocious crime.” 

“ These are horrible pictures, Philos'. Are they not, Doc- 
tor ? He is so inveterate a maligner of the sex, that I do 
believe my faith in women would be one day completely 
overthrown, if it was not for my inbred reverence of 
them.” 

“Your inborn passions, say. They are the true cham- 
pions. When they are weaker one day, your reverence will 
diminish and your faith will turn to skepticism without be- 
ing transmuted by my malignity. Your blindness, my dear 
Aletlii, is that of thousands and tens of thousands. You see 
the outside ; you never penetrate the heart ; or you shut your 
eyes when it unfolds to you of itself. You adore the angel, 
and presume not to lift the rainbow-colored wings that lap 
over weakness and deformity.” 

“ I have put him at all events upon his poetry, Doctor. 
What would you have me do, my misogynal instructor ? ” 

“ Simply, my philogynal pupil, divest yourself of all pre- 
dilections, and make no difference between he and she, when 
they are before the tribunal of moral judgment. What do 
we daily see in married life ? Parental affection frequently 
divided between the parents, frequently exclusively on the 
male side. The birds, a class of beings which you particu- 
larly love, because, as you rightly say, they have more of 
purity of life than all others, will teach you a lesson. In 
some birds you will find the male take his turn in the nest 
and his share in the care of the young when hatched. Hero 
in this land, you may see a species of Grossbeak which is 
very curious. The little fellow, with a delicate but strong 
thread which he knows how to prepare or to select, suspends 
his nest from the end of a slender bough high up, to guard 
the young from reptiles. His house has three compartments. 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


263 


In the hindmost rests the brood, the middle is for his part- 
ner, and the foremost is his own, where he sits on guard, his 
favorite food the glowworm stuck on a bit of clay to the wall, 
so to speak, of his chamber, so that some have thought it 
was to light his watch. There is a careful husband and 
father for you ! A modern science, of which I will not pre- 
tend to judge, seats the love of offspring in a particular con- 
volution of the cerebellum. It undoubtedly is a separate 
quality, greater or less according to the individual, and more 
or less active according to circumstances which promote or 
retard its development and strengthen or. diminish its energy. 
Women generally have it larger.” 

“ The organ ? ” 

“Yes, if you like. But I know nothing about that — not 
having been used to feel their occiputs. But the quality or 
propensity, the love of progeny, is with women generally 
greater than with men, and for obvious reasons ; God has so 
willed it. But it exists also in men, and more largely in 
some men than in some women. To speak then of women 
as necessarily good mothers, or by nature lovers of children, 
is to talk ignorantly and to pronounce superficially. They 
are but so in general, and I verily believe there are as many 
hard of heart in that way, as I have found them, you know, 
in another. My pepperbox churchsteeple was largely philo- 
progenitive, and it was her prospective maternal tenderness 
that combated the suit which she had the effrontery to sup- 
pose was meant to gratify it.” 

“ The Doctor will hardly know what you mean.” 

“ It does not matter,” said that quiet personage; “ for here 
we are as far as we can go.” 

Aletlii, whose cheerfulness had begun to be excited by 
Philoscommon’s allusion to his amorous speculation, was in- 
stantly and painfully recalled to the situation and to the ob- 
ject of their journey. The Jesousian coach had stopped ; the 
Salaman coachman opened the door; and with a beating 


264 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


heart and rather pale cheek Aletliitheras followed his less 
excitable companions. 

Though the crowd at whose outer edge they were set down 
was large, the surgeon had little difficulty in mining his 
way for all three close to the soldiery, which was already 
forming in hollow square, the native regiment in which the 
mutiny had occurred directly in front of the gallows, from 
which dangled ten nooses cruelly *short, and before which 
squatted all of the condemned, motionless as if already dead. 
At a right angle with this was another native regiment. On 
the third side, or behind the gallows, with four field-pieces 
between them and the native troops stood the regiments of 
Philautians. In the open side of the square were five other 
cannon, pointing outward. And in the midst of the square 
were mounted officers, some few civilians, and finally the 
general with his staff. 

All the eighteen mutineers were marched before the native 
regiments, and their offence and the punishments awarded 
read out in a loud, clear voice. This done, the ten that were 
to hang ascended, which they did unfalteringly, the scaffold, 
and stood over the trap, when a noose was adjusted to the 
neck of each and a white cap drawn over his face. A file of 
nine musketeers marched into the square. Between them 
and the five cannon, three men kneeled dow T n, whose eyes 
were bandaged and their arms tied behind them. Then five 
other men were stood directly before the mouths of the five 
cannon, one before each, and their arms spread out and fas- 
tened to the wheels. These too, though pale, aw r aited mo- 
tionless, and seemingly impassive, the moment of annihilation. 
And on these alone gazed our party. 

There was no additional cruelty of delay. In an instant 
was heard, “ Ready ! Fire ! ” A horrible explosive sound, sud- 
den, concussive, heavy, as if of many thunders gathered into 
one ; a clcud of sulphurous smoke, streaked by what seemed 
a single fan-shaped flash of vivid red fire ; and then, masses 


OP ALETHITDERAS. 


265 


of flesh, large and small, and limbs, and fragments of cloth- 
ing, all looking black in the gray vapor, were seen darting 
upward and sideward and descending in a frightful shower 
to the ground. A bloody arm, entire from the elbow, struck 
the younger traveler on the left shoulder, forcing him to 
stoop. He turned very pale. The elder looked at him for a 
moment with silent concern, but, the next, took his hand and 
pressing it led him forward to where the surgeon had ad- 
vanced to the cannon, the troops beginning already to file 
away. — Everywhere lay horrible relics of the five bodies 
and clots of gore, with scattered pieces of cotton cloth and 
uncoiled turbans in flames or smoking with dull fire. The 
surgeon stooped and lifted a heart. “ It only now has 
ceased,” he said, “ to pulsate.” His tone was still emotion- 
less, and he dropped the bloody mass, not indeed roughly 
but seemingly with unconcern. It fell beside a heap of 
entrails twisted together and torn from a body which was 
seen cut completely in two. Crymoker wiped his fingers on 
the dewy ground and dried them with the envelope of a let- 
ter, then, looking at a head which lay with the face up, 
perfect, said, “You see, the death has been the briefest of all 
agonies, or rather a sudden stupefaction, an instantaneous 
paralysis of all sensation. It was their fate; and they met it 
as men should meet their fate.” He was not answered ; for 
Aletlii was already walking away, and Philoscommon follow- 
ing. As they passed where the three men were shot by mus- 
ketry, they saw them lying quite dead, and lifting their 
eyes for a moment beheld ten more bodies swaying and 
whirling in the morning breeze from the beam of the gal- 
lows. 

Without a word, without waiting as usual deferentially 
and affectionately for Philoscommon, Aletlii reentered the 
carriage, and was followed silently by his companions. But, 
when seated, he looked at his shoulder, and, visibly shudder- 
ing, wiped it off with his pocket-handkerchief, which he 
12 


2GG 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


then dropped with a look of mingled horror and disgust 
from the window. 

“ Reflect,” said Philoscommon, “ that these men 'were pos- 
sibly guilty themselves of great atrocities. They may have 
outraged women and cut off their breasts, or spiked babies, 
and amputated little children’s feet.” 

“ Be it ; but two wrongs never make a right,” said Ale- 
thitlieras. 

“ Oh, that is exploded ethics,” rejoined the schoolmaster. 
“ Gunpowder has a wonderful effect in disposing of moral 
objections.” 

Notwithstanding the tone, "which was intensely sarcastic, 
Alethitheras seemed to think the pleasantry ill-timed. But 
he made no remark. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

Tells how a grandson of the Duke of Pachycephaltis came to 
honor them with an interview . Charmed with his 
sketches of military service in Serica , Ale- 
thitheras abandons the idea of visit- 
ing that ancient country. 

The surgeon accompanied the travelers also to Indraput. 
From there it was the intention of Alethitheras to go to 
Serica, but an accidental conversation made him abandon 
the idea in disgust. 

Philoscommon, who was anxious that he should visit that 
original country, had been giving him a sketch of its history 
from the first-recorded and lialf-fabulous emperor, three thou- 
sand years (so claimed) before the Jesousian era, down, and 
was describing its customs, some of which struck the younger 
traveler favorably, or at least amused him, while others roused 


OP ALETHITIIERAS. 


267 


but his aversion or his pity and disdain. The picture which 
the schoolmaster had drawn of the opium-smokers squatted 
with their backs to the wall of the place where the poison is 
prepared and dealt out to them, some of them already stupe- 
fied, or idiotic, or entranced, while others are awaiting the 
moment of sensual ecstacy and dreamy bewilderment, had 
particularly a painful attraction ; which was not lessened 
when the sombre pencil was transferred to the private cham- 
bers of the rich, where, surrounded often by lascivious paint- 
ings, the miserable voluptuary courts in secret the same semi- 
insensibility to outward objects and the same confused and 
dim and generally sensuous day-dreams. 

“ I wonder,” said the younger traveler, “ that a govern- 
ment despotic at once, and paternal as it professes to be, does 
not put a stop to such soul and body destroying practices.” , 

“ It has sought to do so ; but the Philautians interfered, and 
compelled the imperial parent to indulge his short-sighted 
children.” 

“ What ! ” 

“ O you know I have showed you that philanthropy is, next 
to candor and modesty and righteousness, the most conspicu- 
ous characteristic of a Philautian. To do good to others he 
spares no trouble, and war and bloodshed are trifles when 
they promote the gratification of some of the human race. 
The Philautians, forcing the wretched peasantry of Hind to 
cultivate the poppy, insisted upon selling its product to the 
Seres. The triple-clawed dragon forbad. What right had 
he to govern his own people, or to make contraband any 
goods of any other people ? Therefore, when his servants 
seized the smuggled opium-chests, and having drilled holes 
into them sunk them in salt water, the Philautians demanded 
indemnity, and made w'ar to enforce it.” 

“ Heavens ! ” 

“An adjuration of the other place would have been more 
apposite. After the usual destruction of life and property, 


268 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


the usual results followed : the weaker party yielded, the in- 
demnity was agreed upon, and the Philautians obtained pos- 
session of an island, to secure, they said, its payment. But 
Philautians are keen-witted merchants : when they had got 
the money, they refused to surrender the security.” 

“ Under what pretext ? ” 

“ They were not certain, clever fellows ! that other condi- 
tions in the treaty would be respected. Then, I should tell 
you, the island proved to be more healthy than they expected ; 
and it was convenient for commerce; and Philautia has 
always her right eye open to that mainspring and mainstay 
of her power.” 

“ But it seems to me that she has always some pretext for 
doing what she professes never to have intended to do. I 
should suspect, in this case, the intention •was always fore- 
most and the pretext but followed as justification — as here 
in Hind-land.” 

u Certainly. The lion never lifts his foot when once set on 
his prey. That is her emblem. Unlike the Royal Tiger of 
this country, which is said never to repeat his spring, the 
Philautian beast will try and try again, and once he scents his 
prey never gives over till he has secured it.” 

“ It symbolizes rapacity and ferocity, quite as much as de- 
termined courage.” 

“ But the ingenuity, the ingenuity, Alethi : you overlook 
the ingenuity of these fighting traders. It -was doing a capi- 
tal business, you will see. Force contraband goods on an in- 
dependent nation, and when they are confiscated call upon 
the confiscator to pay for them, and hold part of his country 
until he does, and then keep the territory as security for 
future good conduct and as a convenient haven for com- 
merce ! ” 

“ Why, they are the pests of creation, these Philautians ! ” 

“ O no, not quite so bad as that. They are the finest fel- 
lows under the sun, when their avarice is not stimulated, or 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


269 


tlieir thirst for glory, or their greed for new territory, or their 
rage for intermeddling, or they have not to do with copper- 
colored, or bronzed, or coal-black barbarians, or if you don’t 
offend their prejudices ; in short, if you keep them close at 
home, and let them have their way there in everything. But 
there were some features of this war with Serica that will 
remind you of the way that things are done here in Hind.” 

“ Not butchery by court-martial, I hope ? ” 

“Not exactly; but a large work in the slaughtering- way 
for all that. The Doctor will be able to tell you better about 
it than I. Doctor ! ” 

“ Don’t call him, Philos' : I heard some one talking and 
laughing there awhile ago.” 

“ But he seems to be now alone. At all events, here he is. 
Doctor, are you alone ? ” 

“ No, but shall be in a few minutes. I have a Philautiaui 
officer with me — an ass, by the by. He is just about going. 
Any thing important ? ” 

“ Nothing pressing. I promised ’Lethi you would tell him 
about the doings of your beloved Pliilautians in Serica.” 

“ Good ; my visitor was actually present there at the time. 
You mean in the war, don’t you ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Shall I bring him in ? ” 

“ Certainly,” said Alethi, to whom this inquiry was ad- 
dressed. “ Who is he ? ” 

“ Lieutenant Thelypliron, a gentleman of more than three 
descents. He i3 a grandson of the Duke of Pachvcephalus, 
and first cousin to Lord Daliphron. Therefore, though an 
ass ” 

“We shall have great pleasure in his company,” said 
Philos'. “ Show the long ears in, Doctor.” 

In entered Lord Daliphron’s cousin, grandson of the Duke 
of Pachycephalus ; a small, dapper-looking gentleman of 
about forty, with red whiskers, a very red face, and rather 


270 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


red hair, a most plebeian nose and vulgar freckled hands, 
but a very dainty foot, admirably booted, and -withal the 
air of a cockney. 

The first thing he did was to stare with an amused look 
at Philoscommon, and say to the surgeon in a whisper so 
loud that every word was heard, “ What a quizz ! He is 
uglier than you said.” 

“ I am so,” quoth Philoscommon with perfect composure ; 
“ but there is one thing that the Doctor omitted to tell you. 
No Philautian can surpass me in the reverence I have for 
undoubted gentility ; and a grandson of the Duke of Pacli- 
ycephalus may command me as his most humble ser- 
vant.” 

The lieutenant was at first taken aback, and despite his 
shallowness seemed to suspect that he was bantered ; but the 
air of Philoscommon was so dignified, even through his odd 
visage, and his tone so thorough-bred, that he began to feel 
that he had fallen into something more than common com- 
pany. “ What the devil did you tell that for, Crymokcr ? ” 
he said with affected vexation. 

“ Don’t blame him,” said Philos' ; “ he considered it your 
best recommendation.” 

“ The Doctor had the kindness to assure us,” said Alethi, 
hastening to interpose, “that we should have from you bet- 
ter information than we could get elsewhere in Serica. You 
were there in the war, I am told.” 

“ Ah, was n’t I ! ” cried the lieutenant, completely in 
equilibrium. “ It was jolly fun.” 

“ So we suppose,” said Philosc. “ £»ut did you find the 
Seres as easy to manage as these poor devils of Hind ? ” 

“We didn’t treat them exactly in the same way, you 
know ; for they were n’t quite yet rebels, you know.” 

“ Though they may one day be. You Philautians con- 
quer everything.” 

“Don’t we! We had to blaze at them in fair fight, 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


271 


not string tliem up and blow them to pieces as we did 
here. I’ll tell you a very good thing which shows them ex- 
actly. You must know they try to scare a man by all sorts 
of devices, as if we were children with popguns. Egad! 
when we got them into that square, or when they got them- 
selves there, they found it no child’s game, by Jove !” 

“ Ah ! how was that ? ” 

“ Why, you must know, the Heavenly People — they call 
themselves that you know — and very curious angels they 
are, by Jove! with their little pig-eyes and big pig-tails — 
they got in great crowds into a square in which there was 
but one outlet, and that a very narrow street or lane. Here 
our cannon played upon them with grape and cannister. 
And as they hurried pell-mell for the street, did n’t they 
catch it ! They fell down, by Jove, by hundreds, one on 
top of the other and never fired a shot in return.” 

“That must have been rare fun,” said Philos'. 

“Why no,” resumed the lieutenant, “there was not so 
much in that. But had you seen us take the long-tailed fel- 
lows flying, as they came down hill ! ” 

“ Really ? ” said Philos'. “ Ftying ? ” 

“Ay, by Jove, did n’t w T e! They came down the hill 
turning summersets, when we opened on them. I thought I 
should have died of laughter, to see them taken on the 
wing as it were and turn backwards, heels over head again 
— but not the way they came.” 

“ No, they might have cried out as the frogs did, It may 
be sport to you, my children, but it is death to us.” 

“ Ay, egad, was n’t it though ! It was immense.” 

“ What ? the laughter, or the death ? ” said Alethi gravely. 

“ O the laughter — the fun, to be sure. You don’t seem to 
see it.” 

“ No,” said Alethi, still gravely, “ I can see neither fun nor 
fairness in shooting men after that fashion.” 

“Eh, don’t you though! Now, that is the funniest thing 


272 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

of all, by Jove ! Why, look you, my serious friend, these 
were nothing but yellow pigtails.” 

“ And I cannot see, if they had been blue ones, wKat differ- 
ence it could have made.” 

“By Jove! ” cried the lieutenant, laughing as if he would 
split himself. “ Is n’t it rich ? Why, he does n’t know, this 
gentleman, what a pigtail with us fellows is. Blue pigtails ! 
By Jove, but that is a good one ! ” 

“ Our friend has never yet seen that strange people,” said 
Philoscommon. “He is excusable. You see, Alethi,” he 
added, turning seriously to the latter, “ it is a matter of com- 
plexion, as I told you. They are but yellow beasts, these 
tumblers. That you know, we have already agreed, was 
sufficient. Here, in Indraput, we know what it means, eh 
Lieutenant ! ” The lieutenant looked as if he did n’t. “ But 
when to yellow skins are added pigtails, why then they be- 
come yellow pigtails, in this gallant, gentleman's parlance, 
and of course are worth no consideration whatever. Do you 
see the difference ? ” Alethi looked as if he would n’t see 
the difference ; and Philos', dreading a quarrel, changed art- 
fully the subject. 

After the lieutenant was gone, Crymoker gave painful 
statistics of the opium-war, comparing them with those of 
the more sanguinary operations in Hind some ten years since, 
when the Country of the Five Rivers was conquered, and, 
after some hypocritical coquetting, was taken possession of 
by the Philautians. “ Here in one battle,” said the surgeon* 
“ twenty thousand of the valiant people perished, being ten 
to one of their triumphant enemies.” 

“ That was a terrible disparity,” remarked Alethi. “ If not 
exaggerated by the conquerors, it showed a great inequality 
in arms.” 

“ It probably was exaggerated, and grossly,” replied the 
surgeon. “ That is a familiar way of making up the esti- 
mate of glory. But the Philautians used with great effect 


OF ALETHITEERAS. 


273 


the bayonet, and the warlike tribe that fought against them 
depended on their artillery and horse.” 

“ Even then,” said Philoscommon, “ there must have been 
prodigious inequality. I always supposed that you Jesou- 
sian nations assigned an important part to the use of cannon, 
especially of late years.” 

“We do,” said the surgeon. “The modern Conqueror 
depended chiefly on artillery ; but here, where alone the an- 
cient Conqueror knew the Land of Hind, the native armies, 
though abundantly provided, were unskilful in its use, and 
probably had guns but little serviceable. At all events, when 
in turn the Philautians came to use it, we see a great differ- 
ence. On one occasion, the natives taking flight became 
crowded on a narrow bridge of one of the rivers, and by 
thousands fell into the stream, the cannon even then contin- 
uing the slaughter and sinking those who did not drown, so 
that the waters were crimson with their blood. It was a day 
of great rejoicing with the Philautians,” continued the sur- 
geon in his frigid tones. “ And accordingly the Primate of 
their country issued a special form of thanksgiving to God, 
in which it was especially remembered that there had been 
no injustice nor cruelty shown by the conquerors.” 

Philoscommon looked in his peculiar way at Alethi. “You 
see,” he said, “ men everywhere and in all times assign to the 
Creator their own attributes. He is the God of armies, and 
the exterminator, not merely with the Leipodermian Psalm- 
ist.” 

“But they carry it very far indeed, these Jesousian hypo- 
crites,” said Alethi, “ when they suppose Him to be blind to 
transactions which every human eye can penetrate, and to 
give faith to professions which deceive not even me.” 

“My dear Alethi, you are only fit for Medamou. But we 
interrupt the Doctor.” 

“ I have only one other remark to make,” said the surgeon. 
“In both these wars, though the slaughter from obvious 
12 * 


274 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


causes was different in degree, it was carried beyond even 
the supposed necessity of warfare. In Serica however fear 
could not have been the exciting motive. I am disposed 
therefore to think that you will find it rather in what you 
suggested as to color. There is, besides this supreme con- 
tempt for colored races ” 

“ Except,” said Philos', “ where the specimens are other 
men’s property, in which case their philanthropy, like other 
cheap commodities, is widely distributed. Excuse the inter- 
ruption.” 

“ Besides this contempt of the race, there is I am persuaded 
an innate brutality in a very large proportion of the Philau- 
tians, and it is by no means confined to the lowest orders. 
If an insurrection should at any time occur in that island of 
theirs where according to our popular rhyme the Devil lies 
buried, if an insurrection should occur there ( as it is not 
unlikely, considering the treatment which from both these 
causes the blacks are there subject to, ) you will find that 
executions will take place as here by wholesale, and that they 
will be recounted by the active agents in them with all the 
gusto or the sangfroid of our popinjay Lieutenant.” 

Here the Doctor left them alone. 

Aletliitheras walked up and down the room for a few mo- 
ments in silence. Suddenly he said : “ Have you set your 
heart on going to Serica, Philos' ? ” 

“ I never set my heart on anything — since my disap- 
pointed passion,” said the schoolmaster with a delectable 
imitation of a sigh. 

“ Then w T e w T on’t go.” 

“ What new whimsey is this ? ” 

“I am sick of Philautian cruelties.” 

“ I don’t know where, in the older part of the world, you 
will go to avoid them. They meddle and mar, where they 
dare put their fingers, everywhere. And what becomes of 
your voyage to Vesputia ? In Serica you will find some 


OP ALETHITHEE AS. 


275 


good ship always ready. There is no certainty of a vessel 
going thither from Hind.” 

“But there are enough to Philautia. We can return 
thither and sail thenbe.” 

“ That is like shunning the fryingpan to take to the fire.” 

“ No, it is n’t. There, in their own country, they are bear- 
able. I never want to see them again in a land where they 
are usurpers and oppressors. Besides, we shall meet Philetus 
there, who w r ill atone, in Philautia, for all Philautians.” 

— “ Who are out of it. Very well. I had hopes to show 
you, how much in certain points the Seres and Philautians 
resemble one another ; for example, in the obstinate belief of 
their national superiority, and consequent contempt of all 
other nations and unwillingness to adopt any improvement 
in their modes of life, government, arts or manufactures, even 
when convinced in their own minds that it is such. But we 
will turn our backs to the oldest empire of the world, the 
land which gave birth to that good and wise man, who more 
than half-a-thousand years before the era of Jesousianisin 
taught the same lofty and true doctrine as its sublime found- 
er, the fear and love of God and duty to one’s neighbor ; 
doctrine so well observed in both Serica and Philautia, that 
in one country, where the filial and 2>arental affections are 
strongest and most permanent, they cut a man into ten 
thousand pieces for an act of treason, while in the other, 
where justice and philanthropy are household words, they 
offer prayers in the churches for the slaughter of myriads of 
their fellow-creatures in a war of conquest, and order men to 
be blown to fragments for asserting that liberty which they 
themselves most glory in possessing.” 


276 


TRAVELS BY SEA 


AND 


LAND 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 

The surgeon proposes to go with them to Vesputia , and hy 
accident opens a new window of his mind. 

Agreeable surprise ; the surgeon declared he would make 
one of their party, if they would have him. He had long 
meditated going to Vesputia, and he could go at no time so 
much to his satisfaction as then when with them. This was 
frankly said ; and the sentiment that inspired it was recipro- 
cated. Notwithstanding his coldness, the doctor’s quiet 
and selfpossessed manner had attraction for Alethi, and the 
schoolmaster found in his society the charm which a well- 
informed and discerning mind has always for the learned 
and the intelligent. So the arrangement was soon made. 
At first the doctor proposed to meet them at the great haven 
on the western coast, but, as they were unwilling to part 
with him and were ready to wait his leisure, they agreed to 
go all together. 

A remark of the doctor’s disclosed on this occasion a new 
trait in his mental character. He had said : “ I believe it 

was my destiny to meet with you and to visit with you the 
New World ; and I am happy to think that it is so pleasant 
a one.” 

“ That reminds me, Crymoker,” said the schoolmaster, “ of 
your remark upon the victims on that horrible field of blood: 
‘ It was their fate, and they met it as men should meet their 
fate.’ Do you believe in fatality ? ” 


OP ALETHITHERA8. 


277 


“ I do.” 

“ Really ? ” 

“ Really ! Is that so strange ? I see you think so. I can- 
not believe otherwise. One of these long days, when we are 
on the water, we will talk this matter over. Enough now, 
that, right or wrong, you have had some proof in those poor 
fellows, who were all I believe Salamans, how well fatalism 
can prepare men to obey so sudden and so terrible a call to 
death.” 

“Surprises never will cease,” said Philoscommon, when 
the two friends were alone. “ Who would have thought that 
so coldblooded yet sensible a fellow as that could be so fool- 
ish. He would deride other superstitions, but you see he 
nourishes one of his own. This is common enough, in one 
way or other, with all men, — out of Medamou.” 


CHAPTER XL. 

The conflagration at sea. The fate of CrymoTcer. How 
Alethitheras owed his preservation to the little 
schoolmaster's coolness and foresight. 

The voyage began auspiciously and continued to be pros- 
perous until they had sailed over three fourths or more of the 
wearisome distance they must measure. They had crossed a 
second time the line of equal night, and had passed the 
point w T herc the sun turns middle-earthward from his journey 
to the frozen North, when, toward the close of a fine day, 
Philoscommon, who was at the bows with Aletlii and the 
surgeon, perceived the smell of fire. Scarcely had he whis- 
pered his alarm to his companions, when the movements of 
the sailors, and the request of the mate that the gentlemen 
should go aft, confirmed him in his apprehensions. 


278 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ It may be got under,” said the schoolmaster. “ But this 
is a bad hour for such an accident. Let us hasten to secure 
what is most valuable.” 

They descended to the cabin, where the two friends tied 
Alethi’s gold and such papers as were of value in their arm- 
pits next the skin. 

By the time they regained the deck, smoke was issuing 
in volume from one of the forward hatches. The captain, 
ordering these to be closed, set the pumps to work and formed 
a chain of men, including the passengers, to pass buckets of 
water to the main-hatcliway, while such of the men as were 
not thus busy were directed to get ready the boats. 

The necessity of this last order became only too soon ap- 
parent. Flames burst from the main opening itself, which 
caught to the mainsail and the rigging, the tarred cordage 
blazing in an instant up to the cross-trees, when immediately 
the whole mainmast with every yard and sail became on fire, 
the thick red flames surging upward to the very top. The 
first boat was lowered without any disaster, though the pas- 
sengers crowded panic-struck about the davits and struggled 
for precedence at the ladder. But now, as the flames gained 
headway, all discipline was lost; the orders of the com- 
mander were unheeded, and indeed unheard ; and after the 
boat was fully loaded, several men jumped into it and overset 
it, so that many were drowned in sight of their companions. 
The sailors however succeeded in righting it ; whereupon the 
same scene again occurred, and a second time the boat was 
overturned with like loss. But when again it was righted, 
the sea being fortunately light and the air calm, the seamen 
approached more cautiously, and the passengers being like- 
wise disheartened by the previous accidents, they were able 
to take on board all that it would hold, including tw T o or 
three women with their children. The two other boats and 
the launch at first met with better fortune, and succeeded, 
though slowly, in picking up some of those w’ho were still 


OF ALETHITIIERAS. 


279 


struggling in the water ; but in one instance the eagerness of 
these poor creatures capsized the boat, and when it was 
righted and only partially full, the seamen refused to expose 
themselves to further risk, and with the other boat and the 
launch, now full, steered off, leaving the struggling and 
swimming men to get upon the spars, casks, and other float- 
ing articles which had been thrown over to form a raft. By 
the captain’s orders some of the remaining crew endeavored 
to lash these together for that purpose ; but before the raft 
was completed many of the passengers leaped overboard 
upon it. Some missed their aim and fell into the sea, and 
while the rest were gaining a footing on it, and others were 
descending to it, the mainmast gave way, and fell all-blazing 
directly on the raft, killing several, wounding and burning 
others, and sweeping some into the sea. The raft too took 
fire in the cordage with which it was lashed together, and 
began to break up. At this moment, the scene was truly 
awful. The cries of despair and of pain from the wounded 
mingled with the crackling and low hissing or murmur of 
the flames, which began to blaze more visibly as the daylight 
faded, and were now gaining rapidly the upper deck. 

At this time, the captain, one of his officers, and some 
seamen were all of the ship’s company that remained on 
board, and around them clung some dozen of despairing 
wretches, imploring for the aid which could not be given 
them. Alethi had refused to press forward when the boats 
were lowered, and once, when his chance of rescue with the 
schoolmaster was probable, had yielded it to a mother and 
her child. Philoscommon no longer urged him, but for some 
reason, having once descended hurriedly into the cabin and 
hurriedly come back, kept his eyes anxiously over the ship’s 
side. In his hand he had a boathook which had dropped 
from the launch and which he had for some purpose seized. 
The surgeon, cool as if nothing unusual was before him, stood 
silently watching the progress of the flames which the faint 


280 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


evening-breeze was carrying forward to the foremast. All 
these stood upon the poop. 

Suddenly, Philoscommon, calling in a low but earnest 
voice on both his companions to follow him, rushed toward 
the cabin-stairs, carrying his boathook with him. 

“Come, Crymoker,” said Alethi. “I know he has some 
plan for us.” 

“ No, I will wait here,” answered the surgeon. “ If you 
succeed, call me.” He said this without even an accent of 
distrust, but said it with decision. 

Philoscommon beckoned passionately, and Alethi. after 
one appealing look to the surgeon, hurried after him. As 
they passed a closet on the poop-deck, which had been used 
as a kind of storeroom by the chief-mate, Philoscommon told 
Alethi to take up a coil of small rope which stood there, he 
himself helping it on to his companion’s strong shoulders. 
“ I had marked this for ours already,” he said rapidly, “ and 
I have a sheath-knife secured.” 

When in the cabin, which was deserted, and lighted only 
by the flames and their reflection on the water, the school- 
master made him set down the cordage on the transom. He 
then leaned out of one of the stern-windows. “ See, Alethi. 
Can you hook it in ? ” Alethi saw part of the raft which had 
separated, and, borne toward them, was beating against the 
stem-post and rudder, and putting down the boathook 
caught it by the lashing. “ Thank God ! ” exclaimed the 
schoolmaster. Taking out his sailor’s-knife, he cut the fas- 
tenings of the coil, and unwinding two or three fakes took 
the end in his hand. “ Now,” he said, “hold by the hook, 
and let me down by the rope.” 

“ No, I will go,” said Alethi. “ O, if we had but Crym- 
oker here ! I wonder he is n’t looking out for us.” 

“No matter. Since you will, get down. But be careful ! 
Here, take the knife.” 

Holding the end of the rope while the schoolmaster sat 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


281 


on the tier or coil, Alethi got down by the projections and 
ornaments of the stern and reached safely the narrow raft. 
Passing then the rope round one of the hinges of the rud- 
der and securing it there, he cut it off to a sufficient length, 
and fastening it by the other end to the lashing which still 
held firm, managed to make the raft fast in its position. 
The schoolmaster now passed down a mattress. Then de- 
scending himself by aid of Alethi and his boathook, which 
the latter held fixed in the port, they used the large re- 
mainder of the cordage to make the raft more secure and 
comfortable, fastening the mattress down by large perfora- 
tions which promised to drain off the washing sea. This 
done, they cut the rope close to the raft, but left it still fast- 
ened to the sternpost. 

The schoolmaster with the boathook, and Alethi, first with 
the rope then with his hands, now worked the raft from 
under the stern, when they came in view of the surgeon, to 
whom both cried eagerly to descend. At that moment a 
frightful scene took place. The surgeon, standing close to 
the quarter rail, was gazing calmly as before, and as if with- 
out a thought of his own danger, on the progress of the 
flames, which had already inwrapped the foremast, and, 
blazing up into the black sky, crackling and flinging off 
sparks and flakes of fire, yet at the same time murmuring 
with a peculiar liquid and oily sound that inspired terror 
and awe, w r ere reaching out their hundred fingers as it were 
to the rigging of the bowsprit. A few of the passengers 
who were left on board -were looking on the devouring flames, 
their despairing faces lighted up by the glare, when suddenly 
that part of the deck where they were grouped fell in, car- 
rying down with it into the horrible crater all who stood 
upon it. 

Then rose from the surviving few the most terrible cry. 
The captain himself sprang overboard, and, followed by his 
officer and the single sailor, swam out in the direction of the 


282 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


launch which hovered in the distance visible by the flames. 
It was only then that Crymoker seemed to hear the low but 
eager and renewed call of Alethi and the schoolmaster and 
prepared to descend. He w r as half-way down, and Alethi 
was stretching out his hands to help him, when by some ac- 
cident li-e lost his hold, and, striking with his head and 
shoulder against both the ship’s side and the raft, fell into 
the sea. He sank at once, and when he rose was borne in- 
stantly by a wave to some distance from the raft. Pliil- 
oscommon put out the pole for him, but the raft itself, no 
longer held to the ship’s side, had swung backward, and he 
could not reach it. He seemed moreover to be crippled, and 
blood was oozing over his right cheek from a cut in his fore- 
head. Then Alethi prepared to jump after him. But the 
schoolmaster held him fast. “ What will you do ? ” he cried. 
u Have I saved you for this? ” 

‘‘But he will drown!” said Alethi, trying to loose liis 
companion’s hands. 

“ And will pull you down with him. Let us work the 
raft, if we can, to him. Keep up, Doctor.” 

“ I can’t much longer,” he answered. “ I am hurt.” 

Alethi now could hardly be restrained from throwing him- 
self overboard. “ I can swim,” he urged. 

But the doctor himself cried out generously, “No, no, 
your friend is right ; I should drown you.” A wave swept 
him further off. “Good-bye. It is my fate. As w r ell here 
as elsewhere. — Look out ! they will sink you ! ” These 
were his last words, as he pointed to the ship's quarter ; and 
they saw five stout men attempting to jump to the little 
raft. 

Without a word, Pliiloscommon gave a shove with the 
hook, aud sent it off, while Alethi cried out, almost in the 
same breath, “It is murder ! ” to him, and to them, “Jump ! ” 
At that moment he looked again to Crymoker, and saw him 
go under, never again to rise. It was so horrible, this drown- 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


283 


ing of their companion whom they could not save, and whom 
he thought Philoscommon would not let him save, that when 
the raft floated off he sought no more to rescue the five pas- 
sengers, but sat down full of gloom. 

But now the foremast went over, and, dipping its end into 
the wave, rose partly quenched, and Philoscommon cried to 
Alethi that four of the men were making for it from the bow 
and probably would reach it. The fifth he said nothing of. 
He had dropped into the water, struggled for a moment or two, 
then, with a gesture of rage at Philoscommon, sunk for ever. 

On floated the raft. “ Cheer up, Alethi,” said his com- 
panion. “We may yet be saved.” 

“ But at what a cost ! ” said Alethi, sternly. 

“Not that of humanity, as you mean to reproach me. 
Alethi, this is unreasonable. Could I have saved Crymoker, 
would I not have done it? Was not my foremost duty, to 
say nothing of my affections, to rescue you ? ” 

“ But have you done it ? ” 

“That is with God and not with us to decide. I have 
tried to, and if I die, it is not you that should call me self- 
ish, or inhuman.” 

“ No, forgive me, my dear, good, brave little old fellow 1 
We at least will die together — as we ought, and as I am 
content.” 

“Don’t make me cry,” said the schoolmaster; “there is 
water enough around us. And for our friend, he has died 
calmly, persuaded it was his doom. Look, look ! ” 

Alethi, who had his back to the burning vessel, turned his 
head. The mizzenmast was now on fire, and the whole ship 
from stem to stern was burning. But no living soul could bo 
discerned on board. And of those who were floating about 
on various articles, none appeared to be much wprse off in 
point of safety than themselves, while the large boat which 
the captain had succeeded in reaching seemed to be making 
toward them. 


284 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Further off floated the raft. The flames gushed out of the 
stern-ports. Then the poop fell in ; the mizzenmast went 
over the side ; and, after blazing some moments longer, the 
ship suddenly sunk, the red light vanished from the ocean 
and the sky, and the stars alone shone out upon the water 
and the desolate few who were floating, oarless, sailless, and 
rudderless, over the fathomless deep that was perhaps to be 
their grave. 

Onward floated the two wanderers, wet often by the waves, 
which still however were not high. And now the moon 
arose, solemn and peaceful, over the waste of waters. Philos- 
coinmon talked of destiny and Crymoker, and when that 
topic was exhausted did all he could to enliven his com- 
panion ; but Alethi was thoughtful, sad, and silent ; till 
finally he appeared to recognize for the first time that he 
was selfish, and rousing himself for Pliiloscommon’s sake, he 
became himself in turn the comforter and encourager. Then 
the little man gave new evidence of forethought. He took 
from his pockets some biscuits and a pint-bottle of wine, 
which he had secured the first time he descended to the 
cabin. After they had supped very sparingly, — for, as the 
sage suggested, they knew not how long they might there 
be floating, — Alethi was persuaded to try to sleep, on the 
condition that in his turn he should be the watcher. Philos- 
common put his arm about him, as he sat up on the wet 
mattress, and kept his eyes roaming over the moon-lit waters 
in hopes to see a sail or one of the boats. But morning 
dawned, and then only, wearied out, Alethi slept, his head 
pillowed on his companion’s shoulder ; and when he woke, 
behold, he was in safety. A boat w r as by the raft, held by 
the boathook, which Philos' had used with his pockethand- 
kerchief as a signal to a ship, which now lay about a mile 
off with her head to the wind. It was a vessel bound from 
Jactantia for the queen of the many-isled sea which flows 
between Vesputia and her sister continent. 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


285 


“And this,” said Pliiloscommon, -when, received kindly 
aboard, they were once more alone together, “ and this too 
our poor Crymoker would have said is the hand of Destiny. 
We are carried to the country where we would be, if not 
directly, yet by a shorter route, though we shall enter it as it 
were by the back-door.” 


CHAPTER X L I . 

The voyage to Chrysoclio'ra. A Vesputian Editor enlarges 
even PhiloscommorCs experience in the manners and 
thought-habits of his countrymen. 

And enter it they did by the back-door. Instead of going 
to the mouth of the Father of Rivers by the regular packet, 
they crossed to the Grand Ocean, and steamed to Chrysop'- 
olis, which, as Alethi took care to remind his companion, was 
the very port they would have reached had they sailed from 
Serica. 

In the little vessel which earned them to the narrow land 
they must first traverse was an Isopoliteian, who was bound 
to the same haven. He was an intelligent, well-informed, and 
lively gray-eyed person, of about middle-age or perhaps 
older; and Pliiloscommon, for the sake of his fellow-traveler, 
improved the occasion to make his acquaintance. This was 
soon after they had left the island. He called himself how- 
ever a Vesputian. — observing to our travelers that his coun- 
trymen bore that name almost exclusively, as well abroad as 
among themselves, because, as he said, it was shorter, more 
graceful, not any more ambiguous than Isopoliteian or citi- 
zen of Isopoliteia, and was their especial right as the greater 
part of the upper continent was theirs, and the remaining 


286 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


part was sure to be in the course of time. As he said this, 
he smiled, and, pointing forward, over the starboard, 

“Yonder,” he observed, is Nova Jactantia, otherwise Do- 
matare'tos, a vast country, rich in natural resources, which 
bounds us on the south-west. A great part of it rebelled, 
and joined our empire, and in the war which resulted from 
this annexation we became by conquest possessors of another 
part, which is the very land you are bound for. We con- 
quered it, I say ; but, unlike other nations, we paid for it 
after conquest ; unlike in this especially the nation which 
most envies us, and hates and maligns us, which keeping 
what it conquers makes the conquered pay for the expense 
of conquest.” 

“ That is Philautia,” said Philoscommon, with a probos- 
cidal gesture. 

“ What else ? In the war, our armies marched from the 
chief seaport of Domataretos to its capital without losing a 
battle, and, better, without an act of malicious or revengeful 
injury ; but Philautia, which tried by the arts of her com- 
mercial agent to keep us out of the capital, amused her dis- 
appointed hate and soothed the gnawing of her envy by 
slander and abuse of every kind.” 

“ It is her wont,” said Philoscommon. “ Mud is as familiar 
to her hands as the bayonet, and she uses both with equal 
address am l with the same remorselessness.” 

The Yesputian’s eye brightened. “ There is a little coun- 
try there, on the inner coast,” (he pointed now to larboard, ) 
“which is inhabited by a miserable tribe of natives known 
as the Culices or Gallinippers. The Philautians assumed a 
protectorate over them and made a king of the chief, giving 
him a cocked hat, a red coat and a sword, on which occasion 
_ it is said his Culician Majesty, approaching the Pliilautian 
vessel, wherein were several ladies, stood up in his barge 
resplendent in these emblems of dignity, but minus any 
breeches.” 


OF AIiETHITHEEAS, 2^7 

“ The jolly Gallinipper ! ” said Philoscommon. “ He must- 
be a wag, and meant to show that while in the splendor of 
his superstructure he was Philautia’s who covered him, fun- 
damentally he was his own.” 

“He has bottom enough, no doubt,” said the Vesputian; 
“ but how long he will keep it with such a hard rider is a 
question. Well, a treaty was made between my country and 
Philautia that had for its object the security of a transit for 
all the world across this very neck of land we are sailing to. 
It was in the power of Vesputia to monopolize the transit, 
but liberal to excess she proposed it should be open to the 
world. At this simplicity the ancient lady laughed in her 
sleeve, — she has always treated her descendant as a child 
that she can overreach, — and, despising us for what she 
thought was inexperience, she violated without scruple the 
conditions of the treaty, and, maintaining her protectorate, 
seized certain islands and erected a colony, two years after 
she had bound herself never to do so.” 

“That is no novelty,” said Philoscommon. “A sharp 
tradesman always takes advantage of a green customer, and 
to be liberal of one’s rights is sure to invite encroachment, in 
other parts of the world beside Philautia.” 

“ But in the end fair-dealing wins the day,” said the Ves- 
putian. 

“ When it is backed by power,” added Philoscommon 
parenthetically. 

“And that is not wanting with us,” returned the Vespu- 
tian, with a drawing-up. of the under lip and under eyelid. 
“It sleeps like the unshorn Samson, but wakes when the 
Philistines are upon it.” 

“ Philautians, that should read,” quoth the schoolmaster. 

“ If you like, in our case. But we shall have no need of 
the jawbone of an ass in the matter of Domataretos. It will 
in due time gravitate towards us, and by a natural law be 
absorbed in our unity as by the superior body.” 


2§8 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

“ And what will yon do with the new star ? ” 

“ Keep it in its orbit, in defiance of a thousand Phil- 
autias.” 

“ But that is not what I mean. What w T ill you do with 
such a piebald race of men as the Domatare'tans ?” 

“ Nothing more than what we do with millions of other 
mongrels, who are moreover vagabonds, which these are not. 
One of the greatest qualifications of our government is what 
is well said to belong to our character as a nation, a wonder- 
ful elasticity which makes it fit all circumstances, contracting 
and expanding as the occasion may require, and never weak- 
ened by the greatest strain. We shall make good citizens of 
the Domataretans, as we do of the ragged Juvernans or the 
ragpicking Micromereians.” 

“ No, I think not ; for you forget the difference of color. 
Your citizenship is conferred on dirty white-men, but never 
on colored-men who are clean.” 

“ It is a just reproof,” said the Yesputian, growing some- 
what red. “We consider it a truth self-evident, that all men 

are born free and equal ” 

“ You mean,” interposed the schoolmaster, “that they all 
of them come alike into the world without a shirt on ; but 
it is not self-evident, I take it, that they will have it at their 
option whether to indue cambric or cotton.” 

“ Or shirtless altogether, eh, be contented with a simple 
dickey. Why so says, almost in your very words, one of our 
authors ! Have you read him ? ” 

“ Whom ? Is he of your popular ones ? ” 

“ On the contrary, of the most neglected. I remember the 
passage, because its oddity amused me when a boy, but its 
author is so obscure that I really could not tell you now his 
name.” 

“ Then you have no relish for wit or humor in Yesputia? ” 
“As a mass, my countrymen have no wit. They have a 
strong perception of a certain kind of humor, and strain a 


OF ALE T HIT II ERAS. 


289 


great deal to laugh at what they consider jokes, but which 
with any other people would be contemned as ineptia. The 
paltriest quibble on a word, uttered in one of the Houses of 
any one of our legislative bodies, is sure to provoke laugh- 
ter, yet those who read it can see in it no point, nor even the 
poorest kind of pun. As for wit and humor as they are un- 
derstood in Alectoreion and Philautia, especially in the lat- 
ter country, there is little of either in our authors, and when 
it occurs it is not always recognized. Hence buffoons and 
second-rate punsters are applauded, while wits and humor- 
ists, except they come to us with a foreign reputation, • are 
rewarded with a yawn.” 

“You are not yourself an author ? ” 

“Not of either kind,” replied the Yesputian with a smile. 
“I am a simple newspaper-functionary, and am actually 
going to take an editor's chair which I have accepted in 
Chrysopolis. In my vocation I have often attempted to 
direct the public to a just discrimination, but, as with the 
countryman in the fable, they prefer their mimic pig to 
genuine swineflesh, though it squeal never so naturally. So 
I have ceased to pinch the bristled ear, and when there is a 
new performance of some favorite bipedal porkling, I an- 
nounce the event, promise the customary treat, and leave the 
judicious multitude to settle their accounts with the popu- 
lar boar in their own way.” 

“ And how,” said Aletlii, who began to be interested, “ do 
you explain the anomaly, that being of the same race with 
the Philautians, and having their language and their litera- 
ture, you should be wanting as a people in those two quali- 
ties of the mind, when as a people you have the credit of 
greater natural intelligence and cleverness ? ” 

“I think that is a mistake,” replied the Yesputian. “I 
do not believe we are more gifted in that way than others. 
Go where you will, certainly among the more cultivated na- 
tions, where will you not find as much ? Are not the Alec- 
18 


290 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


tryons, the Anastesians, the Micromereians, nay the Pliilau- 
tians, therein quite our equals ? It is the cheapness and dif- 
fusiveness of knowledge in our country, the almost univer- 
sality of education, add to this the civil equality, the scope 
there is for personal ambition, and the mental excitation that 
is stimulated and maintained by constant political contests, 
to which w T e owe as a people that greater intelligence 
which you assume to be a natural endowment. When men 
of other nations settle among us ( I mean of course who 
are not ignorant or indigent, ) they are never found behind- 
hand.” 

“Because perhaps,” said Philoscommon, “ that very intelli- 
gence and enterprise which they display in your country were 
in their own the impelling cause of their migration thither. 
But that is an argument on your side. I admit however the 
correctness of your remark, if you confine it to the inhabit- 
ants of cities. But leave the brick and mortar for the open 
fields, and what a wide difference do you then find ! I have 
seen enough of Yesputia to be sure of this, that its agricul- 
tural people ( the natives, understand ) are so far before those 
which are found in all other parts of the world, that they can 
hardly be considered of the same class.” 

“ Granted ; but it is for the reasons I have given.” 

“ In one generation. But the cultivated intellect of that 
one makes the succeeding generation intelligent by inherit- 
ance. And thus you have a natural superiority. However, 
all this does not answer my friend’s question. How do you 
account for the want of wit and humor in general, where in 
general the intellect in all other respects is at least on a par 
with that of the parent nations ? ” 

“ I might answer, — in the same way that the difference in 
our lineaments and in the intonation of the voice, nay in the 
pronunciation even, is generally accounted for.” 

“But I do not notice,” said Alethitheras, “that you differ 
in your own tones from Philautians who are not provincial. 


291 


* 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 

Of course your pronunciation, and that of any well-educated 
Yesputian, must be the same as theirs.” 

“You are mistaken,” said the Editor. “Apart from that 
pleasant intonation which is so common in the metropolis 
of his country, the Philautian lets every syllable be heard. 
The Yesputian expends his breath on the accented one, slur- 
ring all the rest, so that they are often lost in the mouth. 
This fault is rendered easier of occurrence, as it is partly 
occasioned, by his rapidity of utterance. When I was in 
Chaunopolis many years since, I had the honor ( I suppose I 
must so say ) to breakfast with the famous Aik/io-Pliilautian 
poet, Proelpis. He was more than old enough to be my 
father, and was not so amiable a man, in heart, as his poetry 
would have led me to believe. So it was as if he had been 
hoping to criticize me, that he observed, ‘ I should not have 
known you by your speech from a Philautian.’ — ‘ I should 
not suppose,’ I returned, ‘ that you would any well-educated 
Yesputian.’ — ‘ O you are mistaken,’ he replied; ‘I noticed 
a difference at once in Paterpatrise Penicule.’ As Proelpis 
was not himself to the manner lorn , and indeed with all his 
fastidiousness and study had been unable to purify com- 
pletely his own tongue, which smacked a little of his native 
Glotta, he would notice such a difference easily. We have 
not many men so eminent as Penicule, but you will find 
many of his profession among us who had not his advantages 
and must be at the least as inaccurate in tone as he.” 

“ I noticed it years ago,” said Philoscommon, “ and won- 
dered that men of refinement should not try to correct a 
peculiarity so disagreeable, when it is not incorrigible.” 

“ Are you so sure of that ? ” said the Editor. “It is as- 
cribed, like the peculiarities of visage which are known as 
Yesputian, to climatic influence. As the face with us is 
made sharper in its oval, and less rounded in the features, so 
the organs of speech give out a shriller or somewhat attenu- 
ated sound.” 


292 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ But that would not explain all your national faults of 
enunciation, while for the effect upon the intellect, I should say 
you had decidedly therein the advantage of the Philautians.” 

“ Certainly. I said, I might so answer. I do not myself 
believe it has much to do with it. Besides the humidity of 
his climate, the Pliilautian’s love of beer might be supposed 
to influence the rotundity of his visage.” 

“ And the dulness of his intellect. Yet you avow that he 
has truer wit and brighter humor.” 

“You see then that these physical causes have not so much 
to do with the change. In fact, you will find among us men, 
whose families have been for two hundred years and more in 
the country, who never themselves have left it, who are ex- 
posed to all the evil influence of careless-speaking compan- 
ions, yet whom you would not know by their tongue from 
Philautians of Chaunopolis, while many of these and others 
have the full form, muscular shoulders, florid skin, blue eyes, 
light hair and sandy beard which are considered character- 
istic of the parent country. Our corrupted speech, as our 
defective wit and feebler humor, and I should have said our 
sharper and more elongated visage, are to be ascribed to 
other causes; namely, to the strong infusion of Juveman 
blood, and to the indifference generated by our democratic 
manners and the leveling effect of vulgar political associa- 
tions. Men have here no absolute social standard to be 
guided by, and the mixed multitudes they address are not 
the best inspirers of correctness of speech any more than of 
delicacy of wit. The Juvernan has the reputation of native 
wit and native humor; but of what kind are they very 
usually? They are like his manners. For one Juvernan 
who is elegant and courtly, or who makes the least approach 
to refinement, you have ten thousand who have never felt the 
wish to be refined, even if they have formed to themselves 
the idea of what refinement is. The features of the Juvernan 
are what modify the features of the Yesputian. The Vespu- 


OF ALETHITHERA6. 


293 


tian of pare Pliilautian origin does not degenerate. His 
mouth is as well-cut, his face as smooth, his jaw as rounded, 
as his ancestor’s. The long ill-shaped lips with their cun- 
ning and sensual expression, the keen gray deep-set eyes, the 
square, prominent, but not unintellectual forehead, the hard 
jaws, and the thin visage, are, like the careless gait, the un- 
tidy dress and the blasphemous tongue, peculiarities which, 
if they belong to my countrymen, they derive from Juvernan 
immigration, and not from the influence of our climate, which, 
beautiful if inconstant, has for physical improvement every 
advantage, as it stimulates by its excitement of the nervous 
system the intellectual faculties, quite as much as do our 
political contests and our civil independence. If then we 
have not finer wit and truer humor, you must blame for their 
want in general the inappreciative audiences, which are both 
effect and cause and owe their inadequacy chiefly to the 
adulteration of the stock. Besides, in the older countries 
there is a larger class of highly cultivated men, persons too 
who have what is absolutely necessary for the continuance of 
that cultivation, — leisure. With us the plurality of our 
youth leave the college for the countinghouse or the circum- 
scribed studies of the learned professions, and in ninety-nine 
cases out of a hundred they become,, with the addition of 
the causes I have mentioned, more or less indifferent to any- 
thing like mental polish. If then an author arise from time 
to time, who has and cultivates a wit of a subtler order from 
what is usual with us and requiring for its understanding, at 
least for its relish, a familiarity with the higher models, his 
doom is obscurity, unless he secure by some accident the 
stamp of approbation from the older world. But I forget I 
am not writing out a leader , and we are yet two weeks at 
least from Chrysopolis.” 

“ If you make them as pithy when you are there,” said 
Philoscommon, “ I augur for your paper a great success.” 

“ You forget — if I have appreciative readers.” 


294 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“You will create them,” said Alethi. 

“In time perhaps — if I durst write thus. But while the 
grain is growing, the horse will starve ; as perhaps has been 
the fate of my author of the shirt-and-dickey simile. Such 
is destiny,” and the Editor withdrew. 

“And so we come back to our Proseo / ian theme,” said 
Pliiloscommon, alluding to Crymoker’s belief. 

“ It is strange,” observed Alethi, “ that men of every creed 
are apt to put faith in predestination.” 

“They do it involuntarily, and sometimes against their 
own convictions,” said the schoolmaster; “though in the 
present case, I think our new acquaintance meant nothing 
more than if he had said, ‘Such is fortune,’ or ‘It was the 
man’s ill-luck.’ It is a belief I do not winder at ; but I con- 
sider it equally foolish as superstition, as indeed it is a super- 
stition. Here, for example, is a man who has had the mis- 
fortune to be tainted morally by a pernicious companionship. 
He was bom delicate and noble minded ; but the curse of his 
corruption clings to him through all his life, mars his for- 
tunes, misdirects his faculties, enervates his energies. No 
effort that his mind is capable of can help him ; for the evil 
has become physical, and the habit of degeneracy, though 
intermitted for a time, recurs and will recur, in his body and 
in his soul. Now, when this man sees how for no absolute 
fault of his own, but by the accident of his misfortune, he is 
undergoing daily and hourly a condign punishment in the 
perpetual struggle his better and truer nature is compelled 
to make with the vices engrafted in him, and how his best 
virtues are kept in abeyance by the ill-success in life which 
has been the consequence of his involuntary taint, it is natural 
that he should think himself the victim of an evil destiny.. 
But not the less he is in error, and, if he encourages the be- 
lief, infatuated. Man, Alethi, is the subject and victim of 
evil fortune, or the minion of good, as much as the animals.. 
Here is a dog which from the first is petted and made the 


OF ALE T HITHEIt AS. 


295 


companion of a loving master, and is cared for even in his 
old age ; there is his brother of the same brood which has 
been the sport of mischievous urchins when a puppy, has 
been maltreated and starved through all his youth, and when 
in his after days made distempered, by having an old kettle 
tied to his tail ' and drinking ditchwater, is knocked in the 
head as rabid. Man enjoys no exemption from the caprices 
of fortune, and all the virtues that ever ennobled humanity, 
and all the energy that ever impelled the most capable intel- 
lect, will not save him from ill-luck. He sees the foolish and 
the vicious get the better of him, and rise without trouble, 
and he lives perhaps repining, and dies struggling still, neg- 
lected, who, had he had better fortune, would have been 
eminent in position and a benefactor of his race. There is no 
destiny in it. It is, as I said of superstition, man’s egotism 
that makes him think he is fated to anything. He but takes 
his chance in the world, and let us hope only, as I am in- 
clined myself to believe, that there is somewhere even in this 
life a compensation for evil, and that in the very example I 
have supposed misfortune is not without its advantages, nor 
the perpetual struggle with affliction without its consolation 
and its elevating and invigorating influence on the soul.” 

As he said this, a shade of sadness passed over Philoscom- 
mon’s visage ; but in a minute it had vanished, and his nose 
and mouth put themselves into antics as he added, in parody 
of the Editor, “ But I forget I am not reading you a lecture, 
and Fortune may show us yet another freak before we reach 
Chrysopolis.” 


296 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER X L 1 1 . 

The travelers arrive in C hrysopolis. How they met there a 
runaway acquaintance ; and what ensued. 

Fortune was so obliging ; but after, not before. 

Chrysopolis is one of those wonders of urban growth which 
are common enough in Isopoliteia ; but in Isopoliteia only ; 
for there alone an indulgent government and the unfettered 
energies of the people set time and space at defiance, and the 
work of a man’s life in ordinary is done in the revolution of 
a year. Here fortunes are called into existence as if by magic, 
and the little more than proletaire of to-day may be little less 
than the millionaire of to-morrow twelvemonth. Thus the 
enterprising, and the adventurous needy, from all quarters, 
not only of that great continent, but of all the world, swarm 
hither assiduously and are mixed together in the common 
hive. 

It was the third day after our travelers’ arrival, and they 
were on their way to make a promised and warmly-invited 
visit to the sanctum of their new friend, the Editor, when 
whom should they see, standing in the door of a house before 
them, but Ililarius ! 

The artist saw Alethi, turned pale, and was about to hurry 
into the house. But the traveler called to him to stop, and 
springing up the step put his hand upon his shoulder. Hil- 
arius faced about and shook off the hand, coloring as he 
did so. 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


297 


“ Are you afraid ? ” said Alethi. 

“ Afraid ! Not of you.” 

“ Yet you should be, doubly robber that you are.” 

“ Doubly?” 

“ Where is my money ? ” 

“I repaid you all that I could.” 

“ This is too pitiful ! ” cried the traveler with scorn. But 
before he could add another word, the painter exclaimed, 
quickly and passionately, 

“Come! come! come ! You shall see,” and darted into 
the entry. 

Alethi, about to follow, looked first at Philoscommon, who 
said, “ By all means. There is something in his looks that 
shows there is error somewhere. Besides,” he added, as they 
walked townrd the staircase, at which the painter was now 
standing with his hand on the rail, looking back for them to 
follow, “ we should in a minute more have had a crowd upon 
us. They are used to scuffles in this latitude, and you w r ould 
have made a disagreeable scene for the street-curs.” 

The painter turned into a room on the top-floor, and repeat- 
ing, “You shall see! you shall see ! ” opened a portfolio, and 
taking out a slip of paper thrust it into Alethi’s hand, ex- 
claiming, “ There, there, sir ! I was bad enough to take 
away that girl — and I am atoning for it ; but I was no 
thief.” 

The paper was a receipt from some one in Ariospolis for a 
certain sum of money and two pictures, to be delivered to 
Alethitheras on demand. 

“ Why what is this ? who was this person ? ” 

“My landlord.” 

“ I never received anything — money or paintings. There 
was nothing in your study but the larger canvas with the 
outline.” 

The painter looked horrified. “ I left them. By G — I 
did ! ” 

13 * 


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“ With your landlord? ” asked Pliilosc. 

“ Yes, yes, the scoundrel ! ” 

Philosc roared -with laughter. “ Why you are worse than 
before. I thought you a rogue ; but you are a fool.” 

“ There is,” said the artist, turning indignantly from the 
schoolmaster, “a deficit you will see of some few ducats. 
-They were expended while I wrought the portrait of Minn- 
chen ; and I set in balance all I could do, and left, beside the 
portrait, the uncompleted work, which I could you know 
have taken from its stretcher and carried with me, as indeed 
I longed to. It had cost me great labor, and it promised me 
some fame. I sacrificed them both to quiet conscience.” 

“ And where is ” — Minnchen , Alethi was about to say ; 
but he filled the break with the words, “ the girl ? ” 

“ Gone.” 

“Dead?” 

“No, that were better; for herself, if not for me. Gone 
off — with a new lover.” 

Philosc broke out afresh. The artist again looked indig- 
nant, while Alethi stood amazed, not at his companion’s 
laughter, but at Hilarius’ news. 

“ I declare, I now respect her,” cried Philosc. “ The jade 
has made amends. If she WTonged you ” ( meaning Alethi, ) 
“she has — humph, I suppose I must not say what she has 
done to him.” 

“Say what you will,” said Hilarius. “Your coarseness 
cannot add to my humiliation.” 

“No, but it may paint your stool of repentance,” said 
Philoscommon steadily. “ Did you marry that girl ? ” 

Hilarius looked at him. “ I did.” 

“Then she cuckolded you, as I suj^posed, and as you de- 
served. Are you satisfied ? ” 

For a moment the young man’s cheek was flushed ; but he 
checked himself, and said : “ The wrong I did was great, but 
it was not done to you ; and I have atoned even in the way 


OF ALETHITHEBA8. 


299 


you say.” He folded Ms arms and looked on tlie ground, 
standing opposite Alethi, wliile Pliiloscommon lost all dis- 
position to pursue bis advantage in a new sense of the real 
manliness of the unfortunate though guilty painter. - 

Alethitheras kept his eyes steadily on the handsome face 
of the latter, and at last said with a voice that faltered a 
little, “Hilarius” — The painter looked up surprised. — 
“Will you take my hand?” Hilarius, still more surprised, 
gazed at him, turned deeply red, and laid his small fingers, 
unwillingly, on the manlier hand of Alethi. “Let us sit 
down and talk together.” 

Alethi drew a chair for himself and one for the artist, as 
if it was in his own room, and Pliiloscommon, at his beck, 
placed himself on an easy chair near them. 

“How,” said xilethi, “let us hear all; all that is not yet 
known or conjectured. Did you come to this country di- 
rectly ? ” 

“Ho, we fled by way of Panormus, where we took ship 
for Hew Euerwic. Here I was successful. I painted fools 
— merchants and tradesmen ; and they paid me like nobles. 
It is the generosity of my countrymen. They are said to 
love to make money. It is a common failing, I presume, of 
all men.” Philosc nodded. “ But what they make with one 
hand they are ready to spend with the other.” 

“ Which is not the case with all men,” interposed Philosc. 

“ I shall like your countrymen,” said Alethi. Philoscom- 
mon wriggled. “But proceed.” 

“Portrait-painting, however, began to be dull. With the 
trouble of five minutes’ sitting, and at an expense of one 
hundredth part, baboons could get their miniatures by a sun- 
stroke, and though it made their mouths more like a beast’s 
than a human being’s, and set every wrinkle in tenfold depth 
of effect, and took them always at a disadvantage in expres- 
sion, they were their 4 counterfeit presentments ; ’ they had 
their noses, and their foreheads, and their eyes, and if their 


300 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


hands were like rows of sausages and their knees colossal, 
they did not complain. So I went with Minnchen to the 
new Canobus. Here, in Chrysopolis, I found myself again 
shut out of the market. So I took to mining. I was suc- 
cessful. But one morning I awoke to find Minnchen and my 
money — I should say my gold-dust, both evaporated;” 

Philoscommon was disposed to show enjoyment; but he 
satisfied himself with cocking one leg over the arm of the 
easy-chair he occupied and drawing the other under him on 
the cushion, while, with his nose in motion like a dog’s tail 
with delight, he watched with his sparkling little eyes the 
artist's flushed and angry countenance. 

“ She must have had some great temptation,” said Alethi 
gently. “ What was he whom she fled with ? ” 

“ A miner : a fellow short as myself, but thick and solid, 
with knock-knees, but a breast like Heracles’, which showed 
like a water-dog’s back when his shirt-bosom opened.” 

“ Ah ! ” said Philoscommon, meaningly. 

“ But his face must have been handsome ? ” 

“ No, it was n’t. A pug nose, a red skin, a bald skull, a 
pair of eyes like a pig’s ” — 

“ In expression, I suppose ? ” said Philoscommon interrog- 
atively. 

“I mean so. Lecherous and saucy, with a twinkle for 
■every woman ; and a mouth of which when I say it was 
made to eat, I paint the animal as well as I am able.” 

“ It is strange,” cried Alethi. 

“ Not at all,” said Philosc, putting down his legs and rub- 
bing them. “ The story is as old as the tub-man. He was 
not even clean, I suppose ; but he had no need to go to 
EpVyra, where the foremost of orators found it too dear to 
buy repentance.” 


OF ALETHITHEK A8. 


SOI 


\ 


CHAPTER XLIII. 

They visit their friend the Editor , and get an insight into 
more things than they expected. 

They found the Editor in his sanctum, -r- embayed in 
the equilateral hollow of his writing-table, embanked with 
piles of scribbled paper, and blockaded by half-a-dozen 
friends. These were all introduced, in one breath as it were ; 
and each one took in turn and shook heartily both our trav- 
elers by the hand ; a custom which the Editor afterwards as- 
sured Alethi, who he suspected did not like it, arose not so 
much from a consciousness of equality as from real friendli- 
ness of disposition, in which the Vesputians excel all others 
in the world. 

One of them, a tall, dark-browed, lank-visaged man, with 
a very large and ill-shaped mouth, before he followed the 
rest as they filed out of the ofiice, ejected over the uncar- 
peted floor a quantity of reddish-brown juice of some herb 
he was chewing, and, wiping his mouth with the back of 
his hand, asked our travelers to take a drink. Alethi de- 
clined, but Philoscommon said aside, with a wink, to the in- 
viter : “ The Governor never drinks ; but when I can get a 
chance, I ’m for you.” 

“ Are you ? That ’s hearty. There ’s my ticket. Call on 
me at any time. But I say, is he your gov’nor ? You look 
old enough for his, intirely.” 


\ 


302 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ But. he is for all that,” said Philosc, putting a finger on 
the side of his proboscis. 

“01 see, a sacret, bedad ! ” 

“ I’ll tell you all about it, when I have a chance. Thank 
you, and good day.” 

“ You got well off,” said the Editor, when the lantern- 
jaws had vanished. “ I ’ve known a good man pistoled for 
refusing to drink with a vulgarer fellow than that.” 

“ For refusing to drink ? ” exclaimed Alethi. 

“ O yes, Ave have a hard set among us here in Chrysoco'ra. 
They take offence at nothing, and blow out a man’s brains 
to make something of it.” 

“ But they hang, then ? ” 

“ No, if they did, street-frays would be rarer, and a man 
might slap a scoundrel’s face who insulted him, without the 
certainty of cold steel in his liver, or a bullet, for retaliation.” 

“ I think you will like Vesputia,” said Philoscommon, 
with his peculiar look, to Alethi. 

“ Don’t say that,” said the Editor, earnestly. “ It is not 
Vesputia. You might as well call the mildew the maize, or 
the cankerworm the appletree.” 

“ Why don’t you cut it out then ? ” said Philoscommon. 

“ Is that possible ?” cried the Vesputian. “After receiv- 
ing the maimed, the halt, and the blind, beggars, idiots, 
thieves and assassins, by scores in every shipload, for more 
than half a century , are we to stop now, now when we have 
given them all, so they are not actually in the jail, the alms- 
house, or Bedlam, the right of making laws for us, for us the 
masters of the household who take them in as guests, or ser- 
vants, and support them ? ” 

“ What is that ? ” asked Alethi, in great surprise. 

“When communities are first founded,” replied the Editor, 
“ and are anxious to grow, they invite strangers of all sorts, 
and tempt them by privileges. But it was reserved for a 
great, wealthy, and powerful empire like ours to continue 


OF A L E T II 1 T XI E R A S . 


303 


tlie inducements, which are no longer necessary but have 
become dangerous, and to fling the suffrage indiscriminately 
to men who have no interest in the country, and cannot in 
nature have a feeling for its honor. You will say perhaps,” 
( he turned to Philoscommon, ) “ Why don’t we stop that T 
The last census of New Euerwic shows that in the great 
county of that name, where is the grandest, richest, and most 
populous of our cities, while the native voters are 51,500, 
the naturalized voters are 77,475, and it is shown, by careful 
calculation, that in less than six years the latter will be, in 
that metropolis, as three to one. Can you pass a law to cir- 
cumscribe the privileges of these foreigners, when they them- 
selves alone elect the makers ? ” 

“It is a madness, it seems to me, that involves certain 
ruin,” said xilethi, with a sense of disappointment that was 
pain. 

“ It vvoulddn any other country but our own. Nothing in 
fact can be more demonstrative of the ductility of the gov- 
ernment, than the fact that it stands the strain which the 
laws of naturalization bring perpetually upon it. Here are 
thousands of men ignorant, degraded, naturally lawless, and 
of unbridled passions, both from temperament and the want 
of discipline, and having this lawlessness and this savageness 
of animal impulses augmented by the indulgences so readily 
provided in the cheap ginshops of a great city, and in the 
bribery administered in various ways by politicians, obstinate 
and bigoted, moreover as are all ignorant persons, here are 
they made prominent in the mass of voters, even where they 
do not largely predominate as in New Euerwic, carrying in- 
deed the balance-weight that makes the side they are added 
to the winners, here they are voting for the laws they cannot 
read, the magistrates whose names they cannot spell, and foi 
the tax-makers whose lists of assessment do not affect them, 
or only indirectly through their landlords. Would not stran- 
gers think us crazy ? ” 


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“I have read in your good book,” said Philoscommon, 
“something about taking bread from the mouths of one’s 
children and giving it to the dogs.” 

“ It is worse,” said the Editor ; “ for dogs do not vote for 
their supply of bread-and-butter, nor clamor to have it 
changed to plum-cake. I have now on my table a scrap 
which I mean some day to comment on. It is from a paper 
in the most thriving city of the North-West. It says : ‘The 
report of the Superintendent of Police for the past quarter 
shows 3,349 arrests. Of these 701 were Yesputians, the bal- 
ance foreigners ; the Juvernans, as usual, leading off with 
1,805, or more than half of the whole number ! ’ As this is 
one of our newest cities, you may judge what the record 
would be in the great metropolis, nor can you wonder any 
longer that we should have such things here, where not long 
since the native citizens were obliged to extemporize a sort 
of constabulary and magistracy themselves, not finding the 
laws and their administrators adequate to protect them. 
That man who asked you to drink is a Juveman, who, by 
the prodigious rise in certain gold-mining stocks, became all 
at once so rich that they say he does not know what to do 
with his income. Of course, he is of influence in the city, 
and it is not everybody that would be bold enough to dis- 
please him. He is not a bad fellow; but he has all the 
faults, as well as the natural good qualities of his peo- 
ple.” 

“And what are they ? ” asked Alethi. 

“ It is the common herd I speak of, remember. They are 
suspicious yet open, lavish yet mean. They sponge unscrup- 
ulously on their sisters or their daughters, and are never tired 
of exacting; yet they are hospitable and kind, and what is 
called warm-hearted , — which means simply that they are 
very impulsive and of great animal vivacity; for they are 
deceitful and insincere, their proneness to flattery being com- 
pounded of this latter disjmsition and their complaisance and 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


305 


good-nature. Their chief defect, which is natural, inherent, 
and comes not of a want of education, though this undoubt- 
edly will, in their descendants, eventually modify if not ab- 
solutely check it, their chief vice of character is thoughtless- 
ness and want of providence. Hence their raggedness and 
wasteful poverty, hence their almost unmitigated black- 
guardism.” 

The Editor paused. The schoolmaster grinned approving- 
ly, and said “ Go on.” 

“ Along with other traits common to a barbarous people is 
revengefulness. Slaves of their passions and unscrupulous 
in their indulgence, the least provocation inflames them, and 
the least interference with, not their rights, but the privileges 
they happen to hold, often by usurpation, sets them to medi- 
tate revenge. Is a railway to be repaired, and are their terms 
refused, they beat the superintendents, drive off the laborers, 
place obstructions on the track whereby the lives of many 
unoffending persons are endangered, and fire from ambush a 
volley of musketry on the men who are set to remove them. 
They are the scavengers of the principal cities. Lately, in 
New Euerwic, requiring enormous wages for common street- 
sweeping, and other men, Micromereians, being found to do 
it at a reasonable rate, they cut off the legs of one of the cart- 
men’s horses, cut the throat of another, and, beating the cart- 
man himself, set fire to his stable, he being the indigent father 
of seven children. They are in fact, of foreigners, the people 
least fitted for the universal suffrage of this republic, yet 
being in the largest number they are the people who have it 
most. Used by demagogues, by whom they are corrupted 
and whom they corrupt in return, they hold the balance of 
power there, frequently by false weight, and hence the worst 
municipal government that so great and wealthy a capital 
ever was cursed with. In the lists of its magistrates figure 
largely, if not predominantly, the uncouth patronymics of 
Juverna, as in the criminal courts the like names prefigure all 


806 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


sorts of brutality, from rape and child-murder to mayhem 
and simple battery.” 

“ You seem to like them,” said Philos', ironically. 

“ I am not their enemy. I have met some of the lionestest 
fellows under the sun among them. But I dread them as 
citizens of my country. And, mark what I tell you ! when a 
certain crisis, which is now threatening, shall come on, you 
will find them,- not like the thrifty, educated, thoughtful and 
laborious Micromereian, on the side of order and unity, but 
almost to a man hand in glove with treason, and praying, if 
not fighting, on the side of rebellion and anarchy.” 

“What do you imply?” asked Pliiloscommon, now seri- 
ously. 

“ Are you going north from here, or east and south ? ” 

“ North, I think,” said the schoolmaster, looking at Aletlii, 
“ returning south by way of New Euerwic.” 

“You may find your way barred. Before many months 
the whole of Mesembria will be in a flame.” 

“ Of revolution ? ” 

“What else? It has been smouldering for years. Ten 
years ago I predicted the event, and prepared to demonstrate 
its certainty. But my editor, whom I have since seen cause 
to suspect of a wish to break up the empire, stopped me 
before my second chapter was printed. But the conflagra- 
tion will rage all the same.” 

“ You surprise even me,” said Pliiloscommon, still gravely. 

“What pretext can there be,” asked Aletliitheras, “for 
breaking up an empire whose very extent should be a source 
of exultation to its people ? ” 

“You have hit the cause without intending it,” answered 
the Editor. “ The pretext is the local institution of slavery, 
which the Mesembrians affect to believe in danger. But that 
is but a lever which politicians use to turn-up the firm-seated 
loyalty of their compatriots. Look on that map. You take 
in there at a glance the vast extent of empire you have 


OF ALETHITHER AS. 


307 


alluded to, and destined still to be extended despite ten 
thousand intriguing politicians, with all their disorganizing 
pretexts. In that capacious territory, so rich and great al- 
ready, so boundless in its promises for the future, what fires 
my heart with pride stirs but the selfish ambition and the 
devilish instincts of men who are Satan’s own. They see 
there but the vastness of the common patrimony, and they 
will never rest till they have tried to divide the inheritance. — 
You will now excuse me. I see by your restlessness, you 
understand my emergencies and wish to leave. Thank you 
both for this visit. We shall meet again.” 

“ Let us do so at dinner,” said Alethi. “ Dine with us to- 
day.” 

“ With all my heart. At the hotel-hour, I suppose ? ” 

“ Unless you will let us seat you in private, as we prefer 
and I meant.” 

“ Ho, I should like to point you out some of our notables ; 
and there are other things I can show you best at the com- 
mon board. Besides, our group will be as much by itself 
there as if we were alone. Goodbye so long.” 

When the travelers got back to their hotel, the younger 
one looked very grave. 

“ Arp, you already sick of Isopoliteia ? ” asked Pliiloscom- 
mon. 

“I don’t know what to say,” replied Alethi. “I don’t 
know that I understand our new friend. Do you ? ” 

“ Clearly. Look at that large mirror, where you see at 
once your towering form and my mushroom figure with the 
split stalk. If you were to draw out the staples and bring 
it to the floor, do you know what would be the result ? ” 

“Its destruction, of course.” 

“That is one of the results indeed, and the main one. 
But there is within that another. You would have many 
pieces of lookingglass for one. How that is precisely what 
these men want. They would break the grand mirror, which 


308 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


every one may use in turn and many at one time, that out of 
the fragments they might have one little piece which would 
be exclusively for themselves.” 

“ Can men be so little ? ” 

“ Out of Medamou, everywhere. Did you notice that our 
friend called these traitors Satan's own? You have been 
long enough among Jesousians to know the allusion. If the 
Devil was not contented in Heaven, how are you to expect 
unwavering loyalty on Earth ? The Apostate drew down 
with him a third part of Heaven's sons. His imitators here 
will not be without their proportion of bad angels.” 


CHAPTER XLIY. 

How they passed by the Land of the Puffins. 

Following the advice of their friend, the Editor, our 
Medamousians first traveled east and visited Mesembria. 
Everywhere they found the institution, as it was called, of 
slavery at once a boast and an object of jealous regard. The 
younger traveler, who would have recoiled, himself, from 
the idea of owning a fellowbeing, saw nothing particularly 
revolting in the system as it respected the slaves themselves, 
but wished that the thousands of white laborers he had seen 
everywhere else had as little to complain of, or were in truth 
as much their own masters. Its worst effect, he could per- 
ceive, or did through his Mentor’s glasses, was on the own- 
ers themselves, and on the development of the country where 
it was maintained. “ Slavery,” said the schoolmaster, “ is 
like other human customs, Alethitheras, — you can only at- 
tack or defend it in the abstract ; there are no precedents 
that will either absolutely justify or without appeal con- 
demn it. The bounds of virtue and vice, of right and 


OF ALE TDITIIERAS. 


309 


wrong, are in themselves so insensible a line, that, until men 
and governments widen and blacken it for their own pur- 
poses, it is difficult to see where one begins or the other 
ends, or which in fact is one or the other. Thus what 
in one country and in one climate is encouraged, or at least 
not condemned, becomes criminal in another, and in the 
same country and climate the practice of one age censures 
and prohibits the customs of a preceding one. There was a 
time when piracy was noble. It is not long ago that the 
wreckers on a portion of the coast of Philautia founded their 
chief expectations of material well-being on the destruction 
of vessels and the breaking-up of their cargoes, and of course 
rejoiced in storms, and looked upon drowned men who might 
have disputed their prizes as providential victims. This 
very slavery, which no land more vehemently denounces than 
that Philautia which did her best to introduce it here, was 
once so legitimate an object of commerce that the safety of 
slave-bearing ships was prayed for in the churches. But 
man has a short memory, everywhere out of Medamou, and 
will swear to-day that he never called black yesterday what 
it will be to his interest to have appear white on the morrow. 
There is therefore hope of change, and amelioration perhaps, 
in all things, and the day may come when the descendants 
of our Editor’s favorite Juvernans may talk without blas- 
pheming, be ashamed of rags and nastiness, and go through 
a day’s work without drinking twelve times of poisoned al- 
cohol.” 

Our travelers then crossed the country and went westward 
and northward. At one point, Philoscommon said, “Here 
on our left is Ilatu, the territory of the Puffins, a curious 
class of people that believe themselves the favored of a 
special dispensation, and live under a leader who, being also 
their High Priest and Prophet, w'ields necessarily a despotic 
influence, and reverting, with a convenient confusion of times 
and climes, to the Biblical Patriarchs, assume the right to 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


have as many wives as they can maintain, in which their 
Prophet sets them the example by keeping some two dozen.” 

“ And can such an abomination, such a political absurdity, 
be permitted in so wise a country as this ? ” 

“You call it rightly an absurdity; for where polygamy 
exists there a people degenerates or remains always inferior. 
But though they have given trouble, and caused bloodshed, 
and undoubtedly would be glad to be absolutely independ- 
ent, holding as exclusively their own their large territory in 
this strange empire, where when a people occupy any por- 
tion not yet organized of the common soil, and have attained 
to a certain numerical strength, they consider themselves, 
though they were absolutely every mother’s son of them an 
alien, entitled to the whole in fee simple and to claim to 
have their own laws and own separate though subordinate 
government, — though, I say, the Puffins have unquestion- 
ably a disposition to insulate themselves completely from the 
rest of the republic, or rather in the midst of it, there is 
really no great danger of their succeeding, and indeed the 
risk diminishes every day. Would you like to visit them? 
They have their peculiar temples as well as peculiar rites, I 
mean temples built peculiarly, all under the direction of their 
Prophet, who also is designer and manager of their theatres, 
and you might be entertained.” 

“I hardly think it would be worth while. Their other 
differences from the rest of the Isopoliteians can hardly be 
so marked as in their worship and their domestic fashions.” 

“Why, yes, because in reality they scarcely can be said to 
be Isopoliteians. They are almost altogether foreigners, and 
chiefly Philautians, thus doubly hostile. Perhaps in any 
other country, such a community, with the unlimited power 
it confers upon its head, and its fanaticism, would be really 
dangerous ; but here, in this vast empire, they are compara- 
tively insignificant. And besides, they have a peculiar way 
of getting over difficulties in Isopoliteia. Unfettered by prec- 


OK ALETHITHERAS. 


811 


edents or by prejudice, benignant moreover and indulgent, 
the Government is guided solely by reason and awaits with 
patience for a development which it might enforce directly 
by the strong arm. In the present case, as the Land of the 
Puffins has not that singular, qualified, political independ- 
ence which is conceded to the States and is supposed to be 
inherent in them, the Government has the power of altering 
its confines ; and the probability is, that, as much has already 
been taken from it, more and more will be pared away, so 
that these polygamists will find themselves smaller and 
smaller and pressed closely on all sides by a people detesting 
their pernicious practices and despising their pretended 
faith, and thus will gradually dwindle away, or be so inter- 
mixed with other sects, whose in-coming they cannot pro- 
hibit, that they will finally disappear altogether as a distinct 
people.” 

“ I understand now, I think, sufficiently their political po- 
sition as to the rest of the republic,” said Alethi. “It 
would hardly be worth while to spend any time to see them 
nearer.” 

“We will then give them the go-by. They are a good 
practical people in some respects, and work industriously. 
Let us pray that they may have a revelation before long 
which will bring them back to their senses. To which 
hoped-for amelioration we leave them and their wives.” 


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TRAVELS BY BE A AND LAND 


CHAPTER XLY. 

Wherein they visit the North-West. Pliiloscommon takes occa- 
sion to descant on the naturalization-laws , and shows 
the effect of an excessive foreign element upon 
the spirit of nationality. 

They explored carefully and with satisfaction the North- 
West. Pliiloscommon bade Alethi notice the manly, hardy, 
painstaking, and, where natives, mostly virtuous popula- 
tion. 

“ They are,” he said, “ almost altogether settlers from Nea- 
Philautia, and have that mixture of the generous and the 
prudent, the high-minded and the keen-witted, which marks 
the well-balanced character of the native people of the East. 
If that war should come, which I believe with our shrewd 
Editor (himself an Eastern man) is even now gathering in 
the distance, among the readiest to meet its thunder will be 
these communities ; and when they have helped to conquer 
the Mesembrians, as conquered it is easy to see they must be, 
the latter, who have taught themselves or been taught to de- 
test the people of the East, will swear through thick and 
thin it is the Western blood. And efforts will be made no 
doubt to divorce them politically from their Eastern brethren 
and fathers. But all these machinations, mark you, will fail. 
For here, Alethi, in these prolific fields, are, as I have told 
you, a people such as the world nowhere else can match, and 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


813 


if they clo not love tlieir country, and reverence its greatness, 
where indeed shall patriotism be found ? ” 

“ Yet I confess I cannot see much of that pride of country 
even here, which is so conspicuous, ludicrously if not some- 
times insolently so, in the Philautians and the Alectryons.” 

“ No, they have not the arrogance and self-sufficience of 
Philautia, nor the haughtiness and vanity of Alectoreion, al- 
though the writers and orators of both these countries, which 
laud themselves incessantly, and every minute are ready to 
thank God for making them the flower of the Earth, affect to 
see an overweening vanity of country in the simple Isopolitei- 
an. The Isopoliteian is vain of his country ; but he is vain- 
er, I am sorry to believe, of himself. His affections indeed 
have been diverted from his country by the continual in- 
pouring flood of immigration, which makes him in its midst 
feel as a stranger in his own land ; and the privilege of citi- 
zenship extended to foreigners has been also of an immense 
disadvantage in destroying the spirit of nationality. You 
find Yesputians who scoff at a preference of their country as 
‘proscription.’ Then, to mark their liberality, they go into 
the other extreme and give the foreigner a preference. They 
thus cease to see any difference (except one to the dishonor 
of the State) between the native Isopoliteian and the adopted. 
Hence it is that that glorious feeling which distinguishes 
other nations, and is so exaggerated in some of them, is here 
far from universal, prevailing chiefly with the educated and 
reflective. Politicians, who use the imported citizens as 
tools, get even to despise the flag they should glory in, and 
make no more of their inheritance than Esau.” 

“Less of it then; for, as the story reads, the hairy Leipo- 
derm sold his to his twin-brother, not to an outcast or ad- 
venturer.” 

“ Who would have despised as well as wronged him. In 
fact, Alethi, the whole system of naturalization starts upon 
wrong principles, acts in defiance of philosophy, seeks to set 
14 


314 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


aside tlie simplest laws of nature. The foreigner is obliged 
to take an oath that he renounces allegiance to all foreign 
potentates and especially to the sovereign of Philautia. As 
he cannot hold real property without this oath, he takes it, 
if a man of substance, simply to enable him to do so. But 
what is the solidity of his faith ? The heart not only is not 
affected less for his native land, but is disaffected more by 
reason of this very infidelity, his consciousness of it I mean, 
to the land that has adopted him. Hence we have the con- 
tinual spectacle of naturalized citizens at all times denounc- 
ing everything in the country, either with open calumny and 
bitter invective or with covert sneers and malicious insinua- 
tions. The act of Isopoliteia, I repeat, supposes an unreality 
and an impossibility, and ignores the most lasting instincts 
of human nature.” 

“I have noticed myself,” rejoined Alethi, “what you re- 
mark. It certainly is something surprising the absolute 
license allowed to all foreigners, whether transient or domes- 
ticated, to ridicule, abuse, nay absolutely insult by open 
contempt and depreciation, everything in the Republic but 
its natural scenery.” 

“It is unhappily encouraged by the natives themselves, 
who in the first place are ever hospitable to these strangers, 
and then are fatally disposed to look upon them as repre- 
sentatives of an older society, which they still venerate, as if 
they had not long ceased to be colonists. This stimulates 
the superciliousness of these visitors, especially of those from 
Philautia, and, suffered to speak out their contempt, nay 
encouraged in it by the silent assent and sometimes even by 
the open approval of the mean-spirited, grow insolent, and 
conduct themselves as if they conferred a high honor by vis- 
iting the country and even noticing its inhabitants at all. 
The resident foreigners have newspapers conducted by their 
own countrymen, in which nothing is said but to confirm 
their malignant or stupid prejudices and to encourage them 


OF ALETHITHEEAS, 


315 


in tlie baseness of their behavior to the land that fosters them 
and the people that entertain them as equals. In no other 
country under the sun would such misrepresentation and in- 
solence be endured for a single day in any foreign journal 
published in it, as is here openly disseminated day after day 
and year after year.” 

“ It is a proof, it seems to me,” said Alethitlieras, “ of the 
magnanimity, as it is of the liberty and liberality of senti- 
ment of this great people.” 

“ No, it is a proof that as yet the sense of a great nation- 
ality is not dominant. Say to an individual Vesputian but 
one half of what is daily said to the whole people, and the 
head of the speaker or writer would be broken without com- 
ment. When, as one day will be the case, this great people 
are proud of themselves as a people, they will enforce from 
all foreigners in their midst, Philautians and Alectryons 
especially, an observance of decency.” 

u It is certainly a strange state of things,” said thought- 
fully Alethi. “ I think you gave me intimation of it before 
we came hither.” 

“ Yes, when we lay at Gebel-al-Tarik. I told you that this 
people, who are in fact, as a people, nobler, more honorable, 
more powerful than any other, — in other words, who have 
all the characteristics of candid and ingenuous youth, are 
treated, by the haughty, dissolute, and half-exhausted, old 
nations, as pupils and dependants. — Speaking of papers 
however reminds me, that there is another danger attending 
society and the government in this land, which arises from 
the republication here of the venomous falsehoods and insid- 
ious mis-teacliing of the press in Philautia. Its influence 
over private and even public opinion is all but universal and 
is unintermitted. Using the same language, and having 
correspondents who, by their absence from their native land, 
are doubly wedded to its prejudices and look with peculiar 
rancor upon the Ispoliteian prosperity, — the more so, that 


316 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


to indulge in its expression is to gratify a secret malevolence 
in the Philautian public, and thus give piquancy to their 
observations, — by this means, I say, and by the editorial 
leaders in their chief journals, which, when they want, for 
instance, free trade in Isopoliteia, to help their own manufac- 
tures, write artful articles to cry down a protective tariff, — 
and so, in any other public matter, subserve the home-inter- 
est of Philautia or its foreign policy, by trying to undermine 
the policy or demonstrate the assumed misdirection of the 
domestic interests of the Isopoliteians, now with abuse and 
insolent insinuations, now with compliments that are half 
ironical and wholly insincere, — the press of Philautia is 
continually acting, either through its journals, or its review's, 
upon the general and individual sentiment of the Yesputian 
people. The Archon himself, in all probability, does not 
escape its malarious influence any more than the simplest 
citizen.” 

“I have wondered,” said Alethi, “to see the Yesputian 
press habitually copying, without correction or comment, 
articles which appear to me to have been manufactured pur- 
posely for this market. So that in fact the journalists in 
Philautia, mostly the worst enemies of the Republic, exer- 
cise a power over its welfare second only to that of its own 
most practiced and patriotic writers, — men, for example, 
like our friend in Chrysopolis, far better qualified to teach 
the people, even were their morality of no higher standard.” 

“Yet such is the bitterness of their national malevolence, 
or such their national rudeness and ill-nature, that it is rarely 
the Philautians use for flattery this subtle power, which 
partly an identical vernacular language has given them, 
partly that colonial deferential feeling which still clings, un- 
suspected, to the Yesputian writer. With some exceptions, 
you will observe that its constant display is in the Pharisai- 
cal abuse of everything that is prominently successful in 
Isopoliteia. To hear these virtuous sages talk, one would 


OF ALETniTHERAS. 


317 


think that swindling was an unknown practice in Philautia, 
•although it is notoriously of so constant occurrence that day 
after day the journals there are lamenting or raging against 
some great bubble newly burst, but which only cupidity or 
stupidity could ever have conceived to be anything but wind 
and water.” 

“ Then there is no justice in this world ? ” 

“None whatever for the rising, and too much for the risen, 
whether individual or nation. The way with the world, is 
to keep down what is struggling to get uppermost ; when 
it can do no better, to mount its back and go up with 
it. It is the practice of mankind everywhere, except in 
Medamou.” 


CHAPTER XLYI. 

Criminal justice in Isopoliteia. 

“I should have said ‘fairness’ or ‘fair-dealing,’ not ‘jus- 
tice,’ ” said Alethi after a while. “But how is justice, in the 
legal sense, administered in this great land ? ” 

“ In the Supreme national courts, nobly and with rarely 
defective wisdom ; but in the minor courts of the various 
sections of the country, and especially in the criminal courts of 
New Euerwic, it is contemptible to the last degree. There 
it is difficult to convict a man who has political friends, or 
who has money enough for his advocates. These spare no 
pains; jurors are rejected on the most frivolous pretext, until 
they find them all to their mind ; delays take place during 
the trial, until the public interest and anxiety for justice are 
diminished; then, if, w T ith all their efforts, conviction do 
take place, delays are interposed to the execution, the case is 
allowed to be carried, on the most trivial technicality, to an 


318 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


upper court, and from that again to the one of last resort,, 
and then, if justice be still inflexible, the case being one of 
great flagrancy, the friends of humanity step in. In violation 
it may be said of good taste, as well as in contempt of justice 
and to the dishonor of virtue, various persons, especially 
reporters, are admitted to the cells, who listen to the fine 
Stories of the criminals, report them and awaken public inter- 
est and sympathy, and whose ready hand-shaking and unre- 
luctant converse with the wretches tend to break down the 
barriers between vice and virtue. Then finally, when all else 
fails, up steps to the Governor some influential politician, 
who shows how important in the succeeding election it will 
be to secure the numerous friends of the criminal. The Gov- 
ernor relents, the execution is postponed and postponed, and 
finally, when the public has forgotten the case, there is a 
pardon, or an indefinite reprieve, which is not announced, 
but continues nevertheless. Then there is the convenient 
plea of insanity. A clergyman, given to drink, cuts his 
child’s throat, and is let go. A confectioner, enraged that 
he was about to lose his daughter’s services, shoots her, is 
imprisoned one year as insane, and then let go.” 

“ At large ? ” 

“Yes, not to a lunatic-asylum. A man stabs another in a 
scuffle, is imprisoned a few months. His friends, and the 
weak souls that regard the appeal of a mistaken humanity 
rather than the demands of justice, send in petitions on the 
plea of the ill health of the prisoner, and a weak-minded or 
politically obsequious Governor abuses his prerogative and 
lets him out, as an encouragement to other homicides.” 

“ Can such things be ? ” 

“In Isopoliteia? I told you not to fall in love with her 
too soon. Why I could spend the rest of this afternoon, 
Alethi, in merely recounting the cases of the most infamous 
perversions of justice in the escape of creatures universally 
believed to be guilty, but who had money to fee their law- 


/ 


OF ALETIIITIIERAS. 319 

yers, and all within the few years that I was in Vesputia. 
Aletlii, there is one thing that is to me almost a matter of 
astonishment, as it certainly excites my disgust. Men affect 
to be more benevolent than God Himself.” 

“How? I do not understand you.” 

“If there is any attribute more marked than another in 
the government of the world by those universal laws set on 
Creation, it is its inflexible and inexorable justice. As we 
sow, we reap. The pettiest offence against morality, nay 
against prudence, brings with it its punishment ; vices and 
crimes torment in their consequences the bodies and the souls 
of half-a-dozen generations. Yet man affects to shudder at a 
public execution, and turns a robber on society after serving 
out half his term of imprisonment.” 

“ I had hoped for better things in Vesputia.” 

“Hope it not. The admission of a vast, ignorant, and 
mostly profligate foreign population to the privileges of the 
Vesputian, has demoralized more or less all public function- 
aries and blunted the pride and sensibility of the exponents 
of the law, wdiile private native virtue, finding itself power- 
less, ceases to resist. And as for capital cases where women 
are the culprits ! — Listen to this : 

“A common Juvernan girl, employed in the shop of two 
Juvernan milliners, had an intimacy, it does not matter 
whether innocent or not, with a gentleman. Pie writes her 
romantic letters for a long time ; and finally, the intimacy is 
broken off, and he marries. After the intimacy was inter- 
rupted, she was indifferent, but when he married, it filled her 
w r itli rage ; a common case, and very characteristic of women. 
She buys a pistol and ammunition, travels a thousand miles 
to reach him, goes to his place of business, watches for him, 
fires at him, and when she sees him staggering off with his 
death-wound, recocks the pistol and fires at him again. A 
cabinet - minister visits the murderess, takes her polluted 
hand, comes away declaring he had read of grief and passion 


320 


TRAVELS BY SEA A Is D LAND 


but never saw its reality till now. ' His wife becomes inter- 
ested. Doctors in medicine pronounce ber to have acted 
under an insane impulse. Her counsel tells the jury, if the 
letters of the murdered man are not enough to make any 
woman insane, he should like to know what is. The usual 
rhapsodies of woman’s blighted affection and her sensitive 
honor, and her loving heart, all follow. The counsel says, 

‘ he takes his stand upon the pulsations of the human heart,’ 
talks of the ‘ unquenchable store of woman’s virtue,’ thinks 
‘ the man who murdered female affection should dangle at 
the rope’s end,’ assures the j ury that ‘ the smallest word that 
fell from her ( the murderess’s ) lips would go further than a 
mountain of his ( her victim’s brother’s ) oaths. He did not 
believe she would tell a lie to save her life.’ ” 

“ Was the man a fool ? ” 

“ Ho, he was a lawyer, a pleader ; ‘ he stood upon the pul- 
sations of the heart,’ — an uncertain footing, — and might 
well be giddy. But you remember Leptologos. ‘ There is a 
world hereafter,’ he proceeded to say, ‘ where this poor girl 
would meet with mercy and love, and where she will ; and 
when in addition the blackening state of reproach w r as at- 
tempted to be heaped upon her, then came the panorama of 
suffering.’ ” 

“ The what ? ” 

“ The panorama of suffering.” 

“ What ’s that?” 

“I don’t know, any more than what the premiss is. A man 
who aerobates, or who acrobates on the infinitesimal impal- 
pability of a heart-beat, may become too etherealized to be 
intelligible. Perhaps the reporter was tipsy, or had lost his 
way in the forensic fog of thick-coming fancies. — Then, 
rising in his eloquence, the orator bids the jury, ‘ Go to the 
Insane Asylum ; hear the cries of the women invoking those 
who had ruined them ; ’ and finally comparing to the Rock of 
the Church the doctor who had so luminously aided him in 


OF ALETHITIEEAS. 


321 


his plea of insanity, he cried, If evidence like his he ‘ broken 
down, then farewell the protection of the law ; and welcome 
back the dark ages, if such a case as this is characterized as 
a flimsy case of insanity.’ The jury make a show of reti- 
ring, bring in a verdict of not guilty, the counsel kisses his 
client, and the farce ends with the general transport of the 
multitude and the disgust and indignation and alarm of every 
noble spirit and lover of his country.” 

“But surely, Philoscommon, such a mockery of justice is 
an exception.” 

“ No. A short time previously, a woman shot a man in 
his countinghouse ; and because she professed to have been 
his wife, not mistress, though she had no certificate of mar- 
riage, no witness, could neither tell the clergyman’s name, nor 
his residence, nor his church, was acquitted. It was probably 
her successful villany that prompted the vindictive creature’s 
act I have just detailed ; and in fact, while this very-trial was 
going on, a girl in a suburb of New Euerwic attempted to shoot 
her lover with whom she had a quarrel, maintaining too, like 
the Juvernan milliner-girl, that she had no complaint to make 
against the honorable conduct of the man ; which, of course. 
And then on the day of the acquittal, but before it could 
have been known, follows the threat of a woman to shoot a 
man for leading her husband into other women’s company.” 

“ Why a man’s life can be hardly safe in such a country ! ” 

“Not when a woman chooses to take it.” 

“ And how are minor criminal ofFences treated ? ” 

“ Wait till we get to New Euerwic and you will see. Ar- 
rest there a notorious counterfeiter, and his friends will bail 
him for so small a sum, that he can pay for his escape out of 
the profits of his manufacture.” 

“ Alas ! I begin to be weary, Philos'.” 

“No, not yet; don’t be down-hearted; wait till you have 
seen more of Isopoliteia before you long for Medamou.” 

14 * 


322 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER XLVII. 

The travelers come to Botolplis Town , where a delightful 
surprise awaits Alethi. 

In time our travelers found their way to BotolplTs Town. 
With this capital and its citizens the younger one was very 
much pleased, comparing both with cities and their people 
in Philautia, until he found himself wronged by one or two 
shopmen, when he pronounced the likeness perfect. 

What particularly gratified him was that strict observance 
of the Jesousian Sabbath, which had struck him so favor- 
ably in Chaunopolis. He had attended once the service, 
which he found more in accordance with his own religious 
notions than that of the Tritheitans in the Philautian 
churches, and came away greatly impressed by the eloquence 
of one man, who, rising with his theme, had carried his 
hearers with him, up almost to the very height to which his 
own spirit seemed to reach, and whose prayers were not less 
fervid than his preaching. 

Philoscommon listened to his young companion’s eulogy 
of the henicotheian sermocinator, then said : 

“Do you ever pray, Alethi ? ” 

“ Certainly. Not as these Jcsousians, but as you know we 
are taught to do in Medamou.” 

“ Well then, you must have noticed how at special times, 
when your head was confused, or your body enfeebled, or 
you were weary and exhausted, your prayers were languid.. 


OF ALET1IITHERAS. 


323 


while at others, wdien a directly opposite state of mind and 
body prevailed, they were exalted. I will not say that a man 
like you would think himself in this latter state sublimely 
pious, although in the former he might deplore human in- 
firmity and accuse himself of ingratitude and lukewarm 
feeling. It is thus then all a matter of the nerves : religion 
is in the brain, and let the heart (I mean, figuratively,) 
beat never so devoutly, if the pulse respond not to it, if the 
nerves give not the sensation vividly to the brain, there is 
no capacity for devotion. So that all this enthusiasm, 
speaking in the original sense of the word, is, unknow- 
ingly to . the poor worshiper himself, nothing but the issue 
of his excited feelings, and God is nothing more than the 
subject, or, only as the subject, the motive power of the 
excitation.” 

“ Philos', do not shake my faith ! ” 

“ Does that then do it ? Is not yours of better founda- 
tion ? I but warn you, my Alethi, of another of the delu- 
sions of this self-adoring, self-conceited, and more than lialf- 
blinded world we visit.” 

But Alethi had a delight to come in Botolph's Town 
greater than that afforded by either her city or her people, 
her sabbath’s reverent stillness, or the fervid epitlieiasis of 
her preachers. Pliiletus was in the town. They met at the 
very gate of a villa in the suburb, which Alethi had hired 
furnished, for the summer months. 

When the three friends were inside, and after the first 
warmth of mutual greetings, reminiscences, and other impul- 
sive converse was over, Pliiletus observed, with a smile 
in both his mouth and eyes, to Pliiloscommon, “You see I 
am in Vesputia, as I partly promised; and I am well pleased, 
as I predicted.” 

To this the little wise man answered ominous, “Wait till 
you leave it. Nobody, you know, can be pronounced happy 
before his departure.” 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Then Aletlii turned the discourse, though hesitatingly, to 
Athlia. 

“Well, I suppose you are now married, dear Phil etus, and 
Athlia sings those divine songs for you in a house that is 
your own ? ” 

The poet shook his head mournfully. 

“ Why I thought,” pursued Alethi, but still delicately, as 
if fearing there might somewhere be a hidden wound that 
was not yet quite healed, “ that you would have hastened to 
be happy, where there was so much that would have made 
you so.” 

“ All but one thing,” rejDlied Pliiletus. “ You know,” he 
added firmly, “her shape forbade a union. With the pros- 
pect, or the chance at least, of a family before us, it would 
have been selfish to the last degree, criminal before God 
certainly, if not in the eyes of all good men, to tempt her 
to a marriage. It would have been inviting her to entail 
deformity and painful weakness on perhaps several gen- 
erations.” 

“ Had that physical defect appeared in her family before, 
on either side ? ” asked Philoscommon. 

“ I believe not ; I know of no instance,” answered Phil- 
etus. 

“ Then you have been' over-cautious, or over-geperous,” 
said the schoolmaster ; “ for a man of your make and healthy 
constitution might well have good offspring even by a de- 
formed woman. The case I know is more equivocal where 
the defect is in the female parent, as I have no examples to 
adduce of that kind ; but I have seen instances of a whole 
family of which the father has been humpbacked that were 
straight, and some of them handsome. Go ba.ck, and in the 
name of God marry her. It is not now too late.” 

“ It is,” said the poet. “ She is dead.” 

“Hot of grief? ” cried Alethi, deeply moved. 

Philetus made no answer, but rushed from the room. 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


325 


‘'That man,” said Philoscommon, “is the greatest fool I 
have ever met or heard of. He has all his life been doing 
everything for posterity, who after his death will never do 
anything for him.” 

“ They should for you, for laughing at so honest a fellow.” 

“ And what is that ? ” asked Philos 7 . 

“ Why, tar and feather you.” 

“ They are welcome,” said the schoolmaster, “ when they 
can overtake me.” 


CHAPTER XLVIII. 

How Botolph's Townsmen showed themselves to he lovers of 
free speech. Philetus , declining a Vesputian metamor- 
phosis , returns to his country without plumage, 
and as wise as he left it. 

Not long after, while Alethi was still thinking with admi- 
ration and regret on the unselfish but unfortunate man who 
had thrown away his own happiness that his supposable pos- 
terity might not curse him, he heard the street-door slammed 
to and bolted, and the poet rushed back into the parlor. 

“ Have you a closet, or a trunk, to hide me in? ” he cried. 

“ Two or three of them. What is the matter with you ? ” 
“ Feathers and tar,” said the poet. 

“ This is worse than posterity,” quoth the schoolmaster. 
“You are safe here, I think,” resumed Alethi, “ without 
hiding. They will hardly dare to force my house.” 

He went to the window, and looking out saw a group of 
men talking and gesticulating near the gate. Returning be- 
fore they perceived him, he found the poet seated and wiping 
the perspiration from his brow. 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ What have you clone to provoke these people ? ” asked 
the traveler. 

“ Nothing more than use my tongue.” 

“ It ’s an unruly member,” inteijected Philoscommon. 

“ But a Philautian never resigns the right of free speech,” 
urged the poet proudly. 

“ Humph,” quoth Philoscommon, “ he has it stopped 
though frequently, if not with tar, and is stripped for it 
sometimes so bare that feathers would be welcome.” 

“ Ah ! ” sighed the poet, “that is true enough.” 

“But what did you say ?” resumed Alethi. 

“ I lectured last night upon the right of a man to his own 
property, even though that be human flesh.” 

“ Pheew ! ” whistled Philoscommon, plunging his hands 
into his browsers’ pockets. 

“ 1 If the laws,’ I said, ‘ assured the man his property, it 
was nobody’s right to interfere with him.’ ‘ Down with such 
laws ! ’ was shouted from several parts of the house. ‘ Amen, 
gentlemen,' I said ; 1 but while the laws stand, you had better 
lean on them. If every man is to make himself the arbiter 
of what is right, because his conscience, as he fancies, dic- 
tates this or that, he may walk into his neighbor’s house, and 
take away his children because they are mismanaged. A 
bargain is a bargain, and, as you have made it, your first 
duty is to abide by it till it be rescinded.’ Such a storm 
then arose, that I was forced to conclude. A meeting, it 
seems, was held afteiwards in the very room I had paid for, 
and it was agreed to ride me on a rail. I got a hint of this 
as I was just re-entering the town, and not caring to be made 
a rooster qf, as these fellows might call it, barely escaped with 
both my legs as you see.” 

They saved the lecturer from being befowled that time at 
least, and kept him with them several days, till all danger 
of the feather-bed and tar-pot might be thought to be blown 
over. Then Philetus declared his intention to sail back to 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


327 


Philautia on the first opportunity ; nor could he be shaken 
in his purpose. He had seen nothing of the country but 
Botolpli’s Town, yet he wanted to see no more. So he went 
back as he came, as Philoscommon had foretold him he 
would. He had come to Yesputia as a Philautian, he had 
thought and acted there as a Philautian, and he left it as a 
Philautian, with not one prejudice removed, but all confirmed 
through his own imprudence, forever. 


CHAPTER X L I X . 

The Medamousians arrive in New Euerwic , where Alethi- 
theras finds , through more senses than one , a 
good deal to astonish him. 

When the cold season had set in, the travelers found 
themselves in the great city of New Euerwic. If the younger 
one was struck with wonder at the magnificence of the prin- 
cipal streets devoted to business, and of many of those which 
were exclusively filled by dwellinghouses, he was with still 
more, out of these particular streets, at the filth, the intoler- 
able nastiness of all sorts that, in actually often impassable 
piles, obstructed every roadway and kennel. But nobody 
seemed to regard it. 

“Their noses are used to it,” said Philoscommon, making 
fctill uglier in its contractility his own. 

“But their eyes ought not to be. What do these lazy 
policemen do, who see it ? There ! a woman is adding a 
new mass to the old heap. My God ! what a stench ! Come 
awny, Philos', come ! ” 

The policeman saw him pass the nuisance with his hand- 
kerchief to his nostrils and spit vigorously after he had pass- 


828 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


ed it ; but he looked on gravely, as if it were a thing of 
course. 

“ Why don’t the fellows do their duty ? ” repeated Alethi. 

“They don’t know that it is their duty,” said Philos 7 . 
“ The law won’t aid them, if they interfere.” 

“ Why, is there a law ? ” 

“ O yes, and a fine. But the one is never regarded, and 
the other never exacted.” 

“ What a state of things t ” 

“Inevitable, where the law-makers and the executers of 
the law are elected by the dirty wretches who neither care 
for this pollution, nor would tolerate being forced to re- 
move it.” 

“ And is this Isopoliteia ? ” 

“No, this is New Euerwic, the abode of strangers, the 
sentina gentium , as you unpleasantly perceive.” 

They got into a cleaner street, that is one where natives 
lived almost exclusively. 

“What did you mean,” asked Alethi, “by those wretches 
electing the law-makers ? ” 

“ And the executers of the law. It is so. All offices are 
put to the vote, — in this city, where if we may believe the 
county-census, according to our friend, the Editor, the foreign 
vote exceeds the native ! And you may judge with what re- 
sult by what you smelt, and by what I now state : — A vil- 
lain, arrested for a most audacious robbery of the person in 
broad daylight, clapped a pistol to the man’s head (his vic- 
tim’s ) who held him, and being thereupon released coolly 
walked away declaring he had five hundred politicians ready 
to get him clear.” 

“Are they crazy in this country ? ” 

“ In this city, you mean. No, they are only bitten by uni- 
versal suffrage. I hope the disease is not communicable, and 
that other nations will keep their political bodies from such 
a certain source of disease and death.” 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


329 


“ Why, I thought, Philos', you approved of the freest suf- 
frage. You certainly talked to that effect in Pliilautia.” 

“Yes, but I did not mean for the ignorant, the vicious, the 
vagabond, those who have no interest in the soil, and for 
whom anarchy would afford a better chance of temporary 
well-being than good government. I will take you now into 
a street which is almost exclusively occupied by immigrants. 
The number of dramshops of all kinds that you will see will 
perfectly amaze you. They extend, too, on two sides of their 
chief temple. Here, and everywhere where these poison- 
shops abound, and their number is almost incredible in the 
metropolis, is the obscure but prolific hotbed of all the dis- 
orders and of the greater part of the crimes that disfigure so 
grand a city. This is it.” 

Alethi again compressed his nostrils, frowning with dis- 
gust. “ Why, Philoscommon,” he cried, “ this must be by 
all odds the beastliest city in the universe.” 

“ Yet to pretend to clean it costs annually by contract more 
than the revenue of many a petty prince.” 

“ And the contractors leave it so ? Why, there is a 
heap of mud and ashes that is absolutely as high as your 
breast ! ” 

“ They are waiting till the ice and snow shall make these 
pretty hillocks unmanageable. Then of course those who 
draw punctually their monthly pay for the work will protest, 
like virtuous citizens as they are and friends of the incor- 
ruptible magistracy, that they are innocent, being under ban 
of the weather. Why, Alethi, any man of sense who had 
the power, and the will to use it, could clean and keep clean 
this whole city, not only absolutely without cost, but with 
profit to its treasury. All that would need to be done would 
be to compel the occupants of each house, by a fine that 
should be a lien upon the property itself, to sweep to the 
middle of the street daily, as is always done here by the na- 
tive and, imitating them, by the respectable among the foreign 


330 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


citizens. The police could have the power to enforce the 
act. Then, carts would take up the dirt, and its sale to the 
farmers would more than pay the mere cost of its removal. 
The ashes and kitchen stutf could be taken away by dustmen 
going down into the areas of the houses for them, as in Chau- 
nopolis.” 

“And why is that simple plan not adopted? It must have 
occurred to many.” 

“ Because there would be no corporation-work for the regi- 
ments of vagabond scavengers who always vote the right 
tickets.” 

“And is the municipal government so worthless ?” 

“ My dear boy, a large portion of its body is made up of 
born foreigners, who go in under the implied condition to 
abuse their functions. The taxes come out of the pockets 
of those chiefly who do not vote for them. Hence they give 
without scruple the finest and most costly lands of the com- 
munity to the use of some of their own religious charities, 
though they refuse a subsidy to the association of gentlemen 
who, without charge, try to keep the streets clear of juvenile 
vagrants, housing them, cleansing them, educating them, re- 
forming them where possible, and sending them, if reformed, 
away to honest labor. But this true charity is contrary to 
the policy of their religion.” 

“How so?” 

“ Priestcraft here, as in their own homes, is the bane of 
moral order, wholesome habits and industry. To retain over 
the children of the aliens that influence which these bigoted 
gownmen would seem to estimate more by the numbers of 
their flock than by their social standing, this is the sole ob- 
ject, and to entrust these children to the good influence of 
the schools and direct association with heretics is, they be- 
lieve, to endanger it. A belief which shows at least a con- 
sciousness of weakness. At all events, it is a well-knowm 
fact that not only is the great Public School system opposed 


OF ALETniTHERAS. 


331 


by them, but the so-called Industrial Schools, which add, to 
the rudiments of education, culture in habits of industry, 
cleanliness, and morality, find their untiring enemy in the 
Ariospolitish priesthood, who see with indifference the filthy 
streets swarm with little vagabonds of both sexes, yet snatch 
them from the arms of those who yearn to save them, to 
wiiose efforts the sole objection they have to raise is, not that 
they teach heresy in religion, but that they will not teach 
religious dogmas at all.” 

They had turned out of the disgusting street into a very 
wide thoroughfare which crossed it, when Alethi remarked a 
knot of boys advancing, of the most blackguard description. 
Stoopbacked, their hands in their trowsers’ pockets, men’s 
coats on, the tails almost at their heels and in every case in 
tetters, with an indescribable devil-may-care look, and a gross 
indecency of expression about their lips as if they never had 
a modest thought and made an hourly jest of all that sober 
people reverence. Dirty they were, and impudent in their 
noisy and uncouth ^gambols, pushing one another from side 
to side of the spacious walk, and blaspheming in the most 
atrocious manner, so that Alethi, followed in file by his 
friend, gave them a w T ide berth. But it was of no avail. 
They had caught sight of Pliiloscommon, and burst into a 
roar of laughter and shouts of ridicule. 

“ What a beauty ! ” — “ By J , Mister, won’t you sell 

us that big nose of your’n ? ” — - “ Don’t abuse the gintleman ; 
it ’s the only big thing, sure, he has about him.” 

“ If you were n’t so dirty, you rascals,” retorted Pliiloscom- 
mon, “ I would make you aware of something bigger.” 

Immediately the vagabonds picked up stones, bits of 
broken crockery, and cinders from an ash-heap, and began 
to pelt our travelers ; and had it not been for the arrival of a 
policeman, they might both have been forced to run or to 
take refuge in some shop. 

“ These,” said Pliiloscommon, “ are children of immigrants. 


332 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


of sucli as form the chief class, in number, of that portion of 
the population.” 

“ How is it possible,” asked Alethi, “ for any state to pre- 
serve its well-being long, with such a herd continually rising 
up and increasing with it ? ” 

“ It does not,” replied the schoolmaster. “ Look at the 
papers; count the ruffian outrages, the burglaries, petty 
thefts, assassinations, murders ; read the list, if you can for 
disgust, then examine the names of the perpetrators. They 
are those, you will see, that indicate in nine cases out of ten 
a Juvernan parentage, precisely as do the peculiar lineaments 
of face, as our Editor drew them for us. Their bigoted relig- 
ion, the reckless drunken habits of the parents, the impu- 
nity with which they brave the laws, owing to the political 
affinities of some of the judges, whose places indeed are 
dependent on their favor, and the demoralization of too 
many of the legal advocates, have prepared them for de- 
pravity and confirm them in it ; and their political educa- 
tion, if I may so call it, finishes the work. I verily believe, 
that so profligate a set of young men, one so dangerous, is 
not be found, in such numbers and with such large liberty, 
in any city of the w T orld.” 

“ But how is it that the native, educated population, that 
of Philautian origin especially, see with patience this moral 
pestilence spreading in their midst ? ” 

“ They do not, not the better class, nor the independent, 
upright lover of his country. But they are not the mass. 
Hay, they are usually cyphers in the land ; for in disgust 
they are apt to neglect their birthright of election, and thus 
the business of the polls is in the hands of a class who profit 
by the ignorance of this order of people. The more that 
come, the better ; they are the tools of the demagogues.” 

“But their country ? ” 

“Country? What matters it, so that their own selfish 
ambition or avarice is subserved ? Country ! Do you expect 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


333 


to find in Isopoliteia a race of simple patriots, or are you 
dreaming of Medamou ? ” 

“I am thinking that ih Medamou alone is human govern- 
ment uncorrupt and incorruptible.” 

“ Even so, and Isopoliteia presents but another example of 
the incompleteness which in various forms is everywhere 
visible in human polity.” 

“ Ah ! ” sighed Alethi, “ could but Heaven have spared at 
least one land in which the free operation of beneficent laws 
and impartial authority might be essayed ! What a magnifi- 
cent specimen might this vast country have presented of the 
blessings of free government ! ” 

“ If the very vices of that system of free government, — 
that is, its principles carried to extremes, — had not led it 
to seek for contamination from abroad. Rotten one day it 
would have become, from its development, according to the 
laws of nature which govern the state as the individual ; but 
to hasten that condition before it had attained to maturity, 
so as to bring on it the sneers of older states already rotten 
from their age, this was folly, this was madness, this is 
crime.” 

“ Pourrie avant etre mure. I read that,” said Alethi, “ in a 
Philautian review.” 

“ Which doubled the blow of its contemptuous sarcasm, 
by ascribing its origin to the Alectryons. I read it too. 
Alectryons and Philautians, all despise, or affect to, the Iso- 
politeians.- Do you know why ? ” 

“ Because of their republicanism ? But is it not affected ? 
the sneer of writhing envy or disappointed malice ? ” 

“ Enough of it ; but not all. There is real want of respect ; 
and I repeat, Do you know why ? ” 

“ Because ” Alethitheras hesitated. 

“Because,” continued Philoscommon, filling up the sen- 
tence, “ they do not respect themselves. So long as Isopol- 
iteia continues to be the washpot and the slopbasin of the 


334 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


Old World, so long as wit-li open arms it welcomes its rabble- 
rnent and its refuse, so long as with indifference to the sneers 
of older nations it goes on with the foolhardy experiment 
of a principle which ignores, as I have said, human nature 
itself, the principle that a full-grown man can by plenty of 
meat and drink, especially the latter, be elevated from a bad 
subject into a good citizen, so long as ignorance shall vote 
for the government of the educated, and debased poverty 
which cares but for the provision of the hour shall dictate 
laws for the refined who build and provide for posterity, so 
long will Isopoliteia merit the reproach of other countries, 
and if shexlo not become a very sink of nations, it will not be, 
you see, for want of the imported material. — How many 
do you think there are now in the Almshouse ? Eight thou- 
sand and odd ; and the city in its republican form is not yet 
a century old. This, in a country of inexhaustible resources 
and of immense extent.” 

“ But they are foreigners.” 

“ Indubitably, or their immediate descendants ; beggars of 
low degree , that come of a begging family. But if this continue 
and the natives of a better brood be crowded out of employ- 
ment, will not the number be enlarged by their own poor?” 

“ It is the most extraordinary infatuation.” 

“ Ay. If the foreign pauper would die, and there an end 
of it, if the foreign criminal likewise left no posterity, one 
might laud 'perhaps the good-nature and humanity of the 
Isopolitcians, though scarcely admire their prudence, that 
they gave a needless refuge to a people w T ho at least could 
not be w T orse off in their own country, and who are not better 
here ; but w T hen you remember that this human vermin prop- 
agates and often more prolifically than the substantial class 
of citizens, and that in a few years, at the present rate of 
increase, Hew Euerwic, with all its palaces and its abundant 
wealthy and honorable population, will be a very pest-house 
of the nations, what then will you say ? ” 


OF ALETKIT1IEEAS. 


33o 


Alethitheras was silent and thoughtful. 

“ It is a curious tiling,” resumed the schoolmaster after a 
pause, “ that while laws can be passed prohibiting the intro- 
duction of disease from foreign parts, notwithstanding such 
laws interfere directly with the interests of commerce, while 
even cattle can be prohibited as an article of import when 
there is a fear of their bringing with them contagion, yet no 
law can be passed or will be passed to stop the immigration 
of persons that are a greater danger to the community than 
any pest. Here all are welcome, the infirm, the crippled, the 
blind, the idiotic, the insane, the dissolute, the convicted of 
great crimes, and no one rises up to stay the introduction of 
the moral pestilence ; or, if a voice is heard in warning or 
remonstrance, it is soon silenced by indifference. There ac- 
tually, Aletlii, have been robbers sent in by certain petty 
sovereignties in Micromereia ; their handcuffs were taken off 
when they entered the harbor ; and the introduction of the 
sweepings of the almshouses of Philautia, with her criminals, 
who are permitted on certain conditions to leave her penal 
colonies, is quite common.” 

“ Can any community be so thoughtless, so spiritless, so 
senseless, as to tolerate such imposition on the part of its 
neighbors ? ” 

“ This does. If the right of suffrage were denied the for- 
eigner absolutely, I think the governments of the chief mari- 
time towns, if not of others, would take steps to correct these 
abuses. But every rascal is looked upon as a future voter, 
and the greater his necessities and the more obtuse his moral 
sense, the readier material he is for the work of the dema- 
gogue.” 

“ But the idiots, the insane, — these can never vote ? ” 

“ I am not so sure of that, here, in this great city, where it 
is not expected that a man shall Jje able to read the names 
of those he votes for. So long as they are sane and not inar- 
ticulate at the time, they may have a chance. At all events, 


336 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


in the indifference as to the kind of immigration, or eager- 
ness to admit the tad for political purposes, they become 
careless in other particulars, aud take whatever rubbish may 
present without question, provided the city be only insured 
for a certain limited time against having these unhappy 
wretches at its cost. Afterward, they arc free to crowd the 
almshouses, as they do the jails and the asylums, almost to 
the exclusion of the native population.” 

They had now re entered their lodgings. Putting down 
his hat, the schoolmaster continued : 

“ When I was here before, a young Yesputian*' had com- 
posed on this subject a parody of a Micromereian poet. Not 
being able to get it printed, he read it to me one day, when 
we were talking, and with accord, upon this theme. I ob- 
tained a copy, and it so happens, have never removed it from 
my pocketbook. This should be it.” The schoolmaster 
glanced his eye over the manuscript before attempting to 
read it, and added : “ But first I must tell you, that at that 
time there were only twenty-seven members ( what a num- 
ber even that, eh ! ) of this gigantic family of republics. 
This is what the poet alludes to in his last stanza. 

PARODY. 

“ Where is the Poet’s native land ? — 

Where Freedom, that with kings had striven, 

Religion, from her temples driven, 

Found altars ’neath the cope of heaven, 

And made the wilderness their stand. 

This teas my native land. 

“ How named the Poet's native land ? — 

Now, With all arts her growth adorning, 

She weeps, her own forced greatness scorning. 

Men called her, in her beauty’s morning, 

The Freeman’s Home, the Happy Land. 

So named my native land. 

“ Why weeps the Poet’s native land ? — 

Weeps that her sons defile her ermine 
To shelter swarms of foreign vermin, 

Make idols of the .... and 


O F A LETHITHE Jt A S . 


337 


“ Hiatus valde .deflendus” said the schoolmaster. “The 
names of the gods are quite obliterated. I suppose Juver - 
nan would n’t rhyme well. 

“ And, though she calls, none stay their hand. 

This weeps my native land. 

“ Whom calls the Poet's native laud ? — 

She calls the many good that throng her, — 

She bids them scorn the votes that wrong her, — 

She shows them What avails ? for stronger 

Are party-ties than her command. 

These calls my native land. 

“ What will the Poet’s native land ? — 

Will ? Ah ! what would she ; for the power 
To do grows feebler every hour ; 

For denser float the clouds that lower, 

Blown westward from each foreign strand. 

Yet — would my native land ! — 

' “ And hopes the Poet’s native land ? — 

Hopes that, when all their blessings leave them, 

Her sons will reck the ills that grieve them, 

As grown too loathsome to deceive them, 

And ’gainst the flood pile more than sand. 

This hopes my native land. 

“ And this the Poet’s native land ? — 

This. Mad for mob-made elevation, 

Her little great-men desolation 
Plant in her, and a ripe damnation 
Will §0011 await Hell’s harvest-hand. 

This is my native land ! 

“ Wo, Poet, to thy native laud ! 

See ! from his seven and twenty stations, 

Soaring by turns in quick gradations, 

Above thy lazar-bonse of nations, 

Yon bird ! And hark ! — I understand : 

Wo to my native land ! ” 


15 


338 


TRAVELS by sea and land 


CHAPTER L. 

Containing further views , not “ dissolving ” ones, of the cor- 
ruption , the extravagance , the misery , the charities , 

0/ the City of Nasty Splendor. 

After dinner, Aletliitlieras, who sat thoughtful, watched 
by Pliiloscommon, though the latter seemed to doze, his right 
heel on his left knee, while the elbow of his right hand rested 
on the uplifted right knee, the forefinger and thumb pressing 
the massive forehead over his shut eyelids, Alethi said, 
without looking up : 

“ Is not much of the evils you deplore, in the government 
of this city, owing to the constant mutations in office, which, 
it seems to me, Philos', can give no chance of perfection, 
besides directly stimulating corruption both in the office- 
seeker and the elector ? ” 

Down went the uplifted leg, and, the ugly hands being 
clapped under both thighs, Philoscommon, swinging for- 
ward, thus replied : 

“ Yes, but the evil of permanence is still worse. Look at 
Philautia. The highest officer of the Crown ( not in the old 
time either, but in this present reign, — the other day, as it 
were) has been twice convicted of having connived at 
bribery and other corrupt means of securing place and emol- 
ument for his own relations.” 

“ But he was punished ? ” 

“ No, the royal pardon each time followed the conviction. 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


339 


And why not ? the distinguished culprit had but followed 
the universal custom. Throughout all the offices of the Gov- 
ernment, the incumbents provide for their family-connec- 
tions. And then, it is one of the most difficult things to 
remove them, and when removed for malfeasance or incapac- 
ity, the pension allowed on retiring is always theirs, through 
the same indulgence that put them into the place. Then, 
the slowness, the indolence, which if natural is encouraged 
by their certainty of retaining office, the want of courtesy 
and obligingness, since they are not dependent on popular 
favor, these and some other disadvantages might be urged, 
which counterbalance all the evils charged to the other side.” 

“ Then I was wrong in my sentiment.” 

“What was it?” 

“I had said to myself, pondering all I had seen and heard: 
It is the very nature of a republic to foster roguery. He who 
holds his office at the mercy of the people must change his 
coat to suit their caprices.” 

“ You were not wrong. But is it not the nature of a mon- 
archy to foster corruption ? And which is worse ? Or in- 
deed can corruption be without roguery? Again, in a 
republic the debasement of morals in its public men is more 
than counterpoised by the independence of their constituents. 
In monarchies, the latter are less free, while the former are 
not less corrupt. We may say, as a general rule, that a politic- 
ian can scarcely be honest anywhere.” 

“But which is the more expensive form of government?” 

“ A monarchy ; greatly so : and for several obvious reasons. 
You are not to judge of a republic in its economy, any more 
than in its morality, by this great city, which is almost an 
anomaly in the country itself. Here, the expenditure is in- 
deed enormous. This arises partly from the mode of taxa- 
tion, w T hich is laid exclusively upon the property, real and 
personal, of individuals. Thus the vast mass of the voting 
people, those especially, who as foreigners have no large in- 




340 TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 

terest in tlie welfare of tlie city and none whatever in its 
reputation, escaping altogether, are better pleased the more 
there is expended, and the magistracy, who are, I have told 
you, in part composed of men of the same nationality, and 
who in all cases are dependent on such a constituency for 
their places, are for a double reason well disposed to gratify 
them.” 

“ In that view, the expenditure must go on increasing.” 

“ It does at a fearful rate, as you might have read. But 
what 'Would stay it ? ” 

“ A different mode of taxation perhaps.” 

“ How ? by the head ? That indeed would bring the les- 
son of economy home to every voter ; but with everything 
in the hands of the poorest class, it would not be easy to effect 
a change.” 

“ Such is the blessing of universal suffrage.” 

“ Under the naturalization-laws, in a city like this. But I 
would rather say, of unqualified suffrage. I am not so sure 
that all should not vote, where there is a certain attainable 
requisite exacted of all, as in Botolph’s Town I believe. But 
a very simple person might see the absurdity of such a 
state of things as we are now discussing. Here, for example, 
in this city, is a gentleman whose wealth is computed by 
millions. Of course, order and good government are dearer 
to him than they can possibly be to a man who has little or 
no property at stake. But to-morrow that millionaire shall 
go to the polls and deposit his vote on the side of order, and 
directly after him a foreign-bom rag-picker, who cannot read 
a word of the language of the country, even if he can of his 
own, and who has not probably a copper set aside from his 
daily earnings, puts down the bag from his shoulder, and 
deposits, under direction, a ticket which neutralizes the mil- 
lionaire’s completely.” 

“ And how do the wretched poor live here ? ” 

“Wretchedly — as everywhere. Therefore I said, I do not 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


341 


see why they are brought hither, except to rid other lands 
of them. In cellars, where the narrow humid floor is por- 
tioned out, and let in part to lodgers; in houses built behind 
others with scarcely space for the pestilential common sink 
between, with the same division of over-crowded never-ven- 
tilated apartments ; and everywhere filth, misery, impurity, 
vice in its most repulsive forms, and squalor indescribable, 
inconceivable, all but unendurable : scenes, Alethi, to make 
good men doubt of Providence and despair for humanity.” 

“But there is charity for these abjects ? ” 

“ Enough of it. Yesputians rarely hoard their money, and 
many of the wealthiest class are more liberal than princes. 
But here, as in Philautia, what vast sums, which might help 
serve to cleanse out these sinks of infamy, suffering and dis- 
ease, are expended to teach naked savages the mysteries of a 
religion which require, even with those who are born to the 
belief, faith more than reason, and are to you and me incom- 
prehensible ! Yet private charity is widely and nobly active ; 
as much so, as if the objects of its good works had natural 
claims to them, instead of being the unfortunate and outcast 
of foreign communities. Thus a gentleman named Rhodon, 
in a single gift to the poor and houseless children, bestows a 
really pretty fortune, and Doliarius endows them with what 
would yield a comfortable income to a single man. By the 
by, will you stroll out, or are you for a nap ? ” 

“No, I would rather walk.” 

“ I will show you what this Doliarius has done for his city. 
Most men, unwilling to part with any considerable portion 
of their wealth, wait till their decease to be munificent ; but 
this princely manufacturer gives in his life-time half-a-million, 
to found an institution where every branch of art and of nat- 
ural philosophy and science is taught gratuitously to persons 
of both sexes, and where a reading-room, well-supplied with 
domestic and foreign journals and magazines, is open to 

All.” 


342 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ All, if all men were like tliese ! ” 

“Would you have the sky all sunshine and the pebbles of 
the earth all precious-stones ? It is rarity that enhances, if 
it does not make, values. But there are probably more of 
this kind of men in Isopoliteia than in all Pantachou. One 
of these, a native Yesputian, long domiciled in Philautia, 
exceeds there in the magnificence of his charities any other 
person. — But what do you think of the women here ? ” 
added the little man, who just then had made a movement 
more gallant than graceful, to give two damsels the wall. 

“ Some of them the most bewitching creatures I ever be- 
held,” said the younger traveler; but whether forgetting or 
remembering at the time Minnchen, ol' Carradora, or the 
fair-haired girl of Medamou, it would have been difficult per- 
haps for even himself to say. 

“Ay, it is a veritable narpa KaXhiyvvcuZ” said the school- 
master. 

“ But in many instances they are very badly dressed.” 

“ You mean in bad taste,” resumed the schoolmaster. 

“ Of course. I speak of the ladies, those for example who 
are directly before us. Evidently they have aimed to dress 
well, but have made themselves pitiable by exaggerated 
finery and ill-assorted colors.” 

“ But are you sure they are ladies ? ” asked Philoscommon. 
“ Observe their mien.” 

“Ah, I see; they are pretenders. But where else could 
we find women able to support such extravagance, whose 
vulgar conceit yet betrays that they have not been always 
accustomed to it ? ” 

“ Where indeed ! That is one of the evils arising from one 
of the good things of this republic. Here the vulgarest may 
rise ; and when prosperous, his creed is that he is on a par 
with the best. So he is indeed in every country, as far as 
respects the position which mere wealth can give ; for every- 
where wealth is worshiped, and the noble of three centuries 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


343 


of patrician ancestry will doff his hat and smile his sweetest 
to the foundling of a ditchdrab, if the latter can underprop 
a falling treasure-house or shake the finances of flourishing 
kingdoms. But the wives and daughters, having less brains, 
are more easily elated than the moneymaking husbands and 
fathers, and disdaining equality assume to be superior, which 
they think is effected by lifting the head, looking severe, or 
reserved, or disdainful, and wearing a small revenue on their 
heads and backs. By Heaven ! Aletlii, that woman with the 
magnificent crimson velvet mantle, sky-blue silk frock six 
yards in circumference, huge white satin bonnet all puffed 
and banded like the cap of some Iihetian peasant, and with 
the white muff held on her prominent belly, is n’t she enough 
to make one enamored of democracy ? ” 

“ To make one think there would be no such thing, if 
women had their way.” 

“Ay, 0* men either, in the circumstances of this ornate 
lady. Democracy is a more artificial state of political society 
than monarchy. It may be said to be always compulsory. 
Its principle is nowhere in the heart. It is the vaunt of 
him who seeks to reach the level, but rarely more than a 
mask with him who has raised himself above it.” 


CHAPTER LI. 

How the travelers meet again Hilarius , and are present at 
the deathbed of the false and forsalcen. 

It was getting to be late. So the travelers deferred their 
visit to the Doliarius Institute (as it is called after its found- 
er) till the next day. Then, on their way thither, they spent 
an hour in first seeing the noble Library which the wise and 
farsighted munificence of a private citizen, himself a foreign- 


344 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


cr, provided for the public. It is conducted on the plan of 
that magnificent one which Philoscommon loved to attend 
in Monachopolis ; “ and as,” said the schoolmaster, “ the 
wealth of the son of its founder is enormous, it is probable 
it will one day have an endowment that will raise it nearly 
to a par with the largest of its kind in the world.” 

After leaving the Doliarius, the strangers followed, from 
its south front, the downward course of the great trading- 
thoroughfare which leads to the Halls misnamed of Justice, 
to the meetingplaces of political debauchery, and by side 
streets to the kindred localities of the common jail and the 
loathsome abodes and haunts of as vile and miserable a 
populace as the world anywhere is cursed with, be it even 
in Chaunopolis. In this broad avenue Alethi was made to 
note the difference in mien, manners and dress of both sexes 
of the people from what he had seen in the fashionable parts 
of the town. They had got into the region of the Leipod- 
ermi, and Alethi was beginning to be displeased with the 
obtrusion in his very face, from awning-posts and dirty sheds 
and projecting windows, of all sorts of wares, especially mens 
clothing, which gave the ample street the confused and rus- 
tic look of a lane in a fair, and furnished a new illustration 
of the misgovernment of the mighty city, when suddenly 
there ran against him, and stopped, a small man whom he 
recognized as Hilarius. 

“ Come ! Come ! Come ! ” he cried, in precisely the 
same words as in the Golden City, but this time seizing 
Alethi by the arm. 

•“ What new picture is this ? ” said Philoscommon. 

“ It has no points for you,” replied Hilarius ; “ it would 
not move your heart. Come, you only ; come ! ” (to Alethi. ) 

“ You misjudge him,” said Alethi. “ His heart is softer 
than you think. Let him come with us.” 

Hilarius made no further objection, no remark indeed, but 
hurried Alethi onward, while the schoolmaster followed. 


OF ALETHI THEKAS. 


345 


Down an execrably filthy street, into another still more 
execrable, where under a less bright climate it would have 
even seemed impossible to live, impossible indeed for such 
as they, until they came to a miserable, dingy, and dirty, but 
not ruinous house, whose street-door, leading into an entry 
fetid wdth the exhalations of the back-yard, stood wide open. 
Here Alethi stopped. But Hilarius said, “ She wants you ; ” 
and up they went the narrow, rickety, and dimly-lighted 
staircase, into other passages, where the atrocious miasm of 
the sinks was mingled with the equally nauseous and poison- 
ous stench of unaired bedrooms, up, up to the very eaves of 
the house. Here, in a little, low, unplastered room, with 
one sliding roof-window, three of whose squares were stuffed 
■with old clothes, while the panes that were unbroken in the 
remaining six were gray and opaque with long-accumulated 
dust and dirt, and whose only furniture, besides a cot, was 
two broken-backed wooden-bottomed chairs, a deal box 
standing on end and serving as wash-stand, and a long, dusty, 
travel-frayed portmanteau, here on the cot, with her large 
eyes closed and all the color gone from her emaciated face 
and riveled yet swollen lips, lay all that was left of Minnchen. 

Alethi, his heart seeming to stop, turned his eyes from 
Minnchen to Hilarius. They had both just passed the door, 
and Philoscommon was only crossing the sill. 

“ It is not my doing,” said the artist, answering to what 
he thought Alethi’s meaning, or anxious to anticipate his re- 
proach. “ That beast, Thdr, the miner, met me this morn- 
ing, and told me, with a devilish grin, I could have my wife 
now, if I wanted, and showed this house. I was going for 
a doctor, wdien I met you, whom she has named more than 
once. — Do you not know us yet, Minnchen ? ” he asked 
with touching tenderness, taking her attenuated and dis- 
colored hand. “ Open your eyes. I have brought — I have 
brought him you wanted.” 

Minnchen opened her eyes; alas! how unlike what once 
15 * 


346 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


they were ! She moved the orbs. But on their cloudy sur- 
face could be seen no recognition, no sign even that she was 
aware there were fresh faces there before her. 

“Do you not know me — Minnchen ? ” said Alethi, scarcely 
able to command his voice. 

She turned her face a little to the sound. “ Speak again,” 
she said. The voice, husky and toneless, was not Minnchen’s, 
any more than were the lustreless and nearly sightless eyes, 
which now had closed again. Her once beautiful hair, neg- 
lected and uncombed, had also lost its brightness with its 
order, and lay tangled, dull, under and oyer her shoulders. 
When at times they raised her head, it would have to be put 
back, and it felt then to the touch as if dusty. “ Speak 
again,” she said. 

“Minnchen — lam O for the days when first I met 

you ! when the prison of the Lazaret was more than liberty 
to me ! ” 

“Yes, yes, I know you now,” she said. But there was no 
emotion in her feeble, monotonous, and as it were muffled, 

accents. “ You are — you are How much I have 

wronged you ! ” 

“ I will go now for the doctor,” said Hilarius hastily to 
Alethi. 

“You need not,” interposed the schoolmaster: “I know 
all that can be done. And it is,” he whispered, “ too late.” 

The artist hesitated. “ Confide in him,” said Alethi : “ he 
knows medicine well.” 

“ Get quickly,” said Philoscommon, “ a bottle of wine, — 
sparkling, if you can. There is not a moment to lose.” 

Alethitheras took out his purse, but the painter hastened 
away. The noise of his steps, as he dashed down the wooden 
staircase, reached the ears of the dying woman. 

“Is that — Hilarius?” she asked. 

“ He has gone for something to relieve you,” replied Ale- 
thi ; “ for wine.” 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


847 


A painful smile passed over the lips ; again, how unlike 
that marvelous smile of old ! Even in that hour Alethi 
thought of it. “ Wine — wine ? For what ? Wine and 
bread both — might have done me good — a week since. 
How could I be so bad ! ” 

“ Never mind, Minnclien ; never mind now.” 

“Yes, now is the time to mind it. You and Hilarius both 
are good. But I deceived you, — and I wronged him; and 
Th6r — has avenged you both.” She stopped ; and the 
motion of her lips showed them to be parched. 

Philoscommon looked around. “ Is there no water ? ” 

“ None but this in the ewer,” said Alethi. “ And it is not 
fit to drink.” 

“ No matter,” said the schoolmaster : “ dip your fingers in 
it, and pass them over her lips. Shall I lift your head, Minn- 
chen ? ” 

“Yes. Who are you ? ” 

“ Do you forget my old friend ? ” said Alethi. 

“ The ugly little man, — who taught me so much ? He 
was kind too, — though he did not like me — for your sake. 
He was right. I have been very wicked.” She made the 
same motion with her lips ; and Alethi moistened them again. 
“I wonder — if — if my punishment here is not enough. If 
you knew how that wicked Ther used me ! I was beaten — 
and starved — and left fireless. It is cold now.” Alethi 
took off his surtout and sj>read it over her, and Philoscom- 
mon, following the good example, doubled his own over her 
feet. “ What a difference between men and men ! But 
Hilarius was good too.” 

The steps were heard rushing up the staircase. The artist, 
out of breath, came in with a pint-bottle of the wine directed. 
Philoscommon, forcing the wires with the back of a pocket- 
knife, started the cork, and a dirty broken tumbler which 
stood on the deal box being rinsed in the ewer, poured out 
some wine and put it while effervescing to Minnchen’s lips. 


348 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ More,” lie urged. “ Drink a little more. There — a 
mouthful more.” 

“ No more,” she said. They laid her head back on the 
scanty and coverless pillow. In a few moments, she revived 
sensibly, and talked with less interruption, as well as with 
more strength. By little and little, they gathered from her, 
that the miner, rough and often brutal even in the first 
months of their cohabitation, had latterly seemed to grudge 
her simple food and raiment. Her illness had probably been 
brought on by want, exposure, and unwholesome air. For 
twenty-four hours she had been utterly alone, till Hilarius 
entered the room. 

It was a story of abandonment common enough, but one 
seldom told to so many persons together interested in it. 
More of the wine was given. But Philoscommon, feeling her 
pulse, shook his head. Presently Minnchen seemed to be 
seized with a fear that she would be again deserted. “Don’t 
leave me ! ” she said. “ Don’t leave me ! It won’t be for 
long.” 

Alethi pressed her hand in silence, and a tear, a man’s tear, 
large and very warm, fell, despite his will, upon it. The 
dying woman was sensible to that. “ That is forgiveness ! ” 
she said, with something like feeling. “ God in his justice 
bless you ! ” She tried to raise the hand to her lips. Phil- 
oscommon signed to Alethi to gratify her. He did so. But 
Minnchen could not kiss the hand. Philoscommon, still 
holding her wrist, called for more wine, and whispered to 
Hilarius by him, “ It is nearly over.” 

They gave her to drink. But she spoke no longer con- 
nectedly. What she said was an incoherent jumble of phrases 
relating to her past life, and in the various tongues she had 
been brought up to speak. 

“ It is,” said Philoscommon, “ the sliaking-up of the ka- 
leidoscope after disarranging the reflectors. All the beautiful 
forms which arose from harmonious adaptation of phrase 


OF ALETHITIIEE AS. 


349 


and concinnity of idea are broken up, and the detached 
pieces are but beads and colored glass.” He said this in him- 
self, and only afterward repeated it to his companion. 

For more than half an hour there was silence in the mis- 
erable loft, unbroken save by the low and intermitted breath- 
ing of the dying woman, who appeared to sleep. 

“ I can feel no pulse at all,” said the schoolmaster. 
Presently her lips murmured. Alethi put his ear near to 
them, and heard, he thought, his own name in its usual ab- 
breviation, and then “ Hilar ” and then “ both good ” 

Philoscommon raised her head. The wine was put to her 
lips once more. But they closed not on the glass. There 
was a feeble sigh ; another, still feebler. The schoolmaster, 
with an expressive look at Alethi, laid her back upon the 
pillow. 


CHAPTER L 1 1 . 

Relates the outbreak of a mighty rebellion in the Great 
Republic, and its moral effects on the magnanimous 
nations of Philautia and Alectoreion. 

“ Well, the war is about to begin,” said Philoscommon one 
morning. “ The rebels have had the assurance to send com- 
missioners to treat with the sovereign power at Pater'patra,” 

“ And were they imprisoned ? ” 

“ Imprisoned ? No, the imbecile to whom is entrusted the 
republican sceptre received them with courtesy and listened 
with deference. He had sworn to defend the Constitution, 
but he professed to believe that it had no inherent power of 
self-preservation ! ” 

“ The traitor, or the fool ! He should have been be- 
headed.” 


350 


T IIAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ No, he should have been served like Atys ; or so served 
himself. What business had a half-man to sit in the seat of 
a hero ? ” 

The first great battle took place. Just as the rebels were 
about to give way, mismanagement, or something worse, 
allowed a reinforcement to reach them, and pressed vehe- 
mently in turn a panic seized the loyalists. 

“It begins badly,” remarked Aletlii, as he read of the 
event. 

“ No, well,” said Philoscommon. “ Had the rebels been 
beaten, the w T ar would probably have ended with conces- 
sions to them. Now they will, in the way of Providence, 
fight till they yield all they profess to fight for. Besides, till 
they are thoroughly thrashed, you will never get out of them 
the conceit that they are better men than their assailants. 
They began with maintaining it, and like the Philautians, 
whom since their treason they very much resemble, they will 
stick to the boast, even when all is over ; but in their hearts 
they will confess their folly, and it may make them soberer 
citizens.” 

Now came the news from Philautia, and her exultation at 
the defeat' of the North. Caricatures had been stuck up at 
the printshops and adorned the pothouses. In fact, she was 
out of her senses with joy. 

“ Of course, being in that condition,” said Philoscommon, 
“she is making curious calculations. But as Balaam’s ass 
spake, so Heaven has willed that through this braying the 
Isopoliteians should know who their friends are.” 

And know them they did, thoroughly. As the contest 
deepened, every insult and aggression short of actual warfare 
that could be employed to the injury of a country was heaped 
without stint upon the loyalists, while every active assistance, 
both secret and open, short of military subsidies, was ten- 
dered bountifully to the rebels. They even went so far that 
The Weathercock , the chief paper of Chaunopolis, lent itself 


OF ALETHJTHERAS. 


351 


to the ill-advised turpitude of crying down the immense 
financial resources of the nation, while it blew up untiringly 
the bubble of the rebel loan. And even thus out of tlieir 
mouths came blessings where they thought to utter curses ; 
for, driven from the markets of Philautia and Alectoreion r 
the bonds of the great government were taken up to an im- 
mense amount by its own citizens, an advantage as well as 
honor to it, while the baseless paper of the rebels fell into 
the hands of Philautians chiefly who were the sworn enemies 
of the mighty republic and co workers with the traitors who 
would have rent its oneness into fragments. 

Through the whole of the tremendous contest, — the grand- 
est in modern times, yet destined to be, for its greatness, the 
briefest, — our travelers remained in Isopoliteia, watching its 
phases with vivid interest, and with fresh wonder at the de- 
spite that seemed to animate certain foreign countries, and 
the extraordinary aberration of their judgment biased there- 
by. So Alethi said one day : 

“ Philos 7 , if Philetus’ countrymen have so generally sided 
with the traitors, is it not perhaps from that love of fair play, 
which, I have heard you say, they boast of as a national 
characteristic ? ” 

“ As they do of truthfulness. Why then did they not wait 
till the time was come to manifest it? Before the struggle 
fairly commenced, they took almost open sides with one of 
the combatants, prejudging them to be the weaker party if 
you like, but professing to believe them capable of overcom- 
ing. Besides, all this is fudge ; there is no equality in any 
contest — unless it were one of Pozzo’s fancying.” 

“ What was that ? ” 

“He was an Anastesian jurisconsult, very famous in his 
day, which was about the middle of the 15th Jesousian cen- 
tury. He professed to arrange the laws of the combat of 
honor, and actually proposed, in order to make the parties 
equal, that if one of them should happen to be the stronger 


352 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


lie should be blooded and purged to bring him down to the 
condition of his antagonist.” 

“But which would have reduced him below it.” 

“ Of course. As I say, there is no equality in any contest. 
If there were, it "would never terminate but with the destruc- 
tion of one of the parties. The Pliilautians see two fellows 
struggling on the ground together. They have not measured 
nor weighed them, nor asked of their comparative physical 
abilities and tenacity of combative will. Yet they cry out, 

‘ Fair play ! ’ and keep all outside parties from interfering. 
It is evident, therefore, the more powerful, or agile and met- 
tlesome of the two must prevail. But suppose they pull at 
the leg of one of them ; or suppose, while two are engaged 
in a stand-up fight, they jerk at the breeches of one, or rub 
the back of the other and give him draughts of ‘ the ardent,’ 
encouraging him all the while by bravos and assurances of 
certain success ? Now, that is precisely the case. The queen 
of this people issued her proclamation putting bn a par the 
two combatants, — which, by the by, was much the same as 
if, a quarrel occurring between you and your son, your neigh- 
bor whom you trusted were to assert that between the boy 
and yourself he could see no difference, and give welcome to 
the former : the Queen of Philautia, I say, issues the procla- 
mation ; and immediately her subjects begin to help in every 
way the rebellious side, building and arming ships for them 
and evading the neutrality-laws, evidently with the conni- 
vance of the Ministry, and are only interfered with when the 
blockade of the Mesembrian ports, which is advantageous 
to her shipbuilding and commercial interests, is threatened 
with destruction by two of their craft. Picture to yourself 
the morality of a nation in which so large and respectable a 
portion thrive by direct infringement of the laws of another 
country, laws necessary for its self-preservation. But you have 
seen them do the like in Gebel-al-Tarik ; and, wherever profit 
is to be made, the Philautians, whether government or indi- 


OF ALETHITHEEAS. 


353 


viduals, set all moral interdiction, and, where they dare, all 
legal prohibition, at defiance.” 

“ They must not have you, Philos', for their . historian.” 

“ Not in this war. For I believe most seriously, that but 
for some implied condition ( implied , understand me ; it is a 
common way in such cases) of material assistance from Pliil- 
autia, as well as from traitors in the north part of the repub- 
lic, these men, in the great disparity both of numbers and 
resources, would never have provoked a war. And I have 
no doubt, but for the adroitness and steady temper of the 
great Yesputian statesman, that assistance would have come 
in the direct shape expected, when the affair of the Pliilau- 
tian steam-packet and the pretended insult afforded the op- 
portunity. The Pliilautians pushed the advantage in defiance 
of their own precedents, because they were all ready and, 
though the Republicans were not so, they did not think they 
would have patience to endure the affront. But I think I 
should be as dangerous an historian for Alectoreion. Look at 
her too ! ” 

“ You mean in the affair with Domataretos.” 

“Yes, wdiile this republic is struggling, and, as the 
Emperor thinks, hopelessly, for its existence. What an il- 
lustration of the assumed magnanimity of that haughty and 
warlike nation ! Under the pretence of enforcing the pay- 
ment of Domataretan debts to their respective subjects, Phil- 
autia ( Philautia, which for her owm interests had abetted 
the nascent state, ) Alectoreion and Jactantia combined to as- 
sail that country at a time when the Isopoliteians could not 
interfere, though, having their hands full, they were hypo- 
critically invited to join the assailants. Then the first and 
last of these Powers pretended to act the part of a certain 
governor in Jesousian story and w T ash their hands of the 
guilt by abandoning Alectoreion in the unworthy purpose, 
which w T as fully carried out by an act of perfidy. The Alec- 
try ons, finding the seacoast city unhealthy, requested permis- 


354 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAUD 


sion of the Archon to occupy a mountain town in tlie inte- 
rior, promising to leave it if actual hostilities should occur. 
As it was an armed power which had set its foot in the coun- 
try for the purpose of enforcing certain demands, it seems 
incredible that the Archon should not have seen into the 
nature of this proposal, or at least foreseen the consequences 
of acceding to it. The place was yielded, and of course 
was retained in defiance of the agreement.” 

“ And can nations, great nations, do these things without 
reproach ? ” 

“ O, it is thought nothing of, only with the little ones. 
You have read of the pot and kettle. It would scarcely do 
for Philautia, for example, to talk of blackness, when she 
herself is so smutted. Well, Alectoreion, to check the growth 
of Isopoliteia as a Power, and to hinder the execution of de- 
signs which she naturally ascribed to it, like her own, set up 
a Ptochalazon prince as Emperor of the country, who gener- 
ously consented to assume the office — when a sufficient 
number of the people should have accepted him.” 

“ Oh ! I understand.” 

“ So did the Prince, and the inventor of imperial suffrage. 
Philautia and Jactantia, rejoicing to see the chestnuts drawn 
from the fire by the catspaw of Alectoreion, looked on com- 
placently, acknowledged the usurper, and the deed was for 
the time consummated.” 

“ And what says the world ? ” 

“It speaks, as usual, according to its interests and its fears. 
Alectoreion pleads, of course, disinterested motives ; and so 
used are all the Powers to the hypocrisy which all practice 
except Isopoliteia, that it excites merely a smile of incre- 
dulity.” 

“ It should excite disgust. It is an aggravation of a crime 
when a laudable motive is claimed for its perpetration.” 

“ My dear Aletlii, that honest indignation shows how lit- 
tle you are fit for any region but Medamou. It is the Pan- 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


355 


tachousian practice, which everywhere else obtains more or 
less, but always most strongly in Philautia and Alectoreion, 
never to hesitate to claim honesty and magnanimity in the 
most selfish actions. The more selfish, the louder must be 
the boast.” 

“ And is such hypocrisy accepted ? ” 

“ Surely ; it is only fools like you and me, who, accustomed 
to the candor of Medamou, feel surprise or indignation. 
Philautia, foremost in frankness and the benignity of philan- 
thropy, plays the magnanimous so constantly, as to believe, 
herself, in her own sincerity ; and Alectoreion, doing the 
same, has nothing to twit her with.” 

“ And how will this usurpation end ? ” 

“The bubble will burst, though it were kept up by more 

than two Emperors. When this war is over There is 

one of those lying newsboys again, bawling out a false bat- 
tle and a victory which we shall nowhere read of to-morrow. 
But to-morrow, we are to draw nearer the scenes of conflict.” 


CHAPTER L 1 1 1 . 

Which records the unheard-of cruelties of the rebel leaders , 
with the malice and mendacity of their 
pseudo-government. 

The war went on with alternate hope and doubt, as all 
wars do. Only the elder traveler never doubted. He had 
scarcely patience with distrust, and saw the right side even 
in defeat triumphant. But when finally the giant, fully 
roused, stood upon his feet, and shaking his locks exerted all 
his strength, Philoscommon was almost beside himself with 
joy. Alethitheras too was full of admiratiou. 

“ There is a sight for monarchies ! ” cried the little sage* 


35G 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ Match that, the best of them ! But what is not the least 
noticeable, Aletlii, in all this vast accumulation of power, is 
that out of the nearly million men that this republic, this 
new country, has already sent into the field, not a tenth part 
are foreigners. And mark me further : when the record of 
the great conflict comes to be written, it will be found, I pre- 
dict, that while this vast preponderance was on the side of 
native manhood and of the only patriotism that is or ever 
can be, yet of those soldiers whose families solicit support 
from the Government nine parts of ten were strangers to the 
country.” 

While the travelers were still in New Euerwic, some of the 
most horrible scenes took place, arising out of the war and 
the brutality of the Juvernan populace, that ever disgraced a 
community, civilized or savage. A draft had been ordered. 
Instigated by demagogues and traitors, both foreign and na- 
tive, who taught them that the war was for the benefit of the 
negro, whom this class of laboring foreigners hold in great 
aversion, and hating, like a very large part of their political 
party, the supreme jiiower of the central government, they one 
night set on fire the houses of the enrolling officers, not for- 
getting the whilst to plunder them, and the next morning 
began to massacre the free blacks, accompanying their atro- 
cious murders by that of one of their own countrymen, who 
at the head of his regiment endeavored to put them down. 
After killing this gentleman, they dragged his mutilated re- 
mains through the kennels and hung them up at a lamp-post. 
One of the inoffensive and defenseless blacks being knocked 
down, his butcher, lifting a heavy stone, let it fall on his 
head, in the same manner and as deliberately as a boy would 
break a large nut. Another, w T hom they had hung at a lamp- 
post, when half- dead they attempted to bum ; and several 
others, including a little child, w^ere massacred in various 
savage wwys. But with a detestable meanness, peculiar to 
this vile class of people, they mingled avarice with vindict- 


OF ALETIITHBRAS, 


357 


iveness, and robbery and petty larceny witli arson and mur- 
der. These miserable blacks, whom they affected to despise 
as well as hate, they stripped them eagerly of their cheap 
furniture, and their wives appropriated the old chairs and 
dirty bedding to their own use. Then robberies took place 
on a larger scale, of shops and warehouses. Finally, obtain- 
ing possession of firearms, they made fight, in the streets and 
from the doors, windows, and roofs of their houses, the 
women in many cases assisting the rioters,, against the police 
and military sent to subdue them, and it was only after sev- 
eral scores were put to death that on the evening of the 
third day the city was quieted. 

Subsequently, the emissaries of the rebel leaders attempted 
to burn New Euerwdc, by setting fire to it in several places 
at once ; and various other devilish schemes to aid a devilish 
cause were resorted to, partly in hopes to effect a temporary 
and partial diversion in their favor, partly to ease the anguish 
of their own disasters by inflicting disaster in any form upon 
their conquerors. 

One of the most remarkable of these was the attempt of a 
certain physician, not a charlatan, but a man of education 
and of some standing in his profession, to introduce trunks 
which he had filled wfitli the clothes and blankets of persons 
who had died of infectious diseases into New Euerwic and 
other cities of the republic. 

“ It was a diabolical as well as desperate attempt,” said 
Philoscommon ; “ but it was not more devilish than the per- 
sistent ill-treatment of their captives in the various prison- 
pens of these traitors. Starved by scanty and disgustingly 
unwholesome fare, forced to drink the water polluted by offal 
and the filth of the drain ; to sleep on the bare ground shel- 
terless, where in winter the poor wretches dug themselves 
holes in the sand and lay in them, while others lay on the 
top, these latter being often found dead in the morning ; shot 
for slipping on a forbidden line, or for looking out at a bar- 


358 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


red window ; every conceivable cruelty was inflicted on tliem 
that in such a situation could be inflicted.” 

“ With what object, or from what motives ? ” 

“ They wished to force the loyalists to exchange with them 
on their own terms ; then, they depleted the National armies 
by so many as they destroyed or ruined, — for when the ex- 
change at last took place, they rendered up, for their own men 
returned to them in better condition than when they were 
captured, and therefore lusty and happy, wretches so worn- 
out, so diseased, with hearts full of despair, that death would 
have been better ; and finally, they were driven to it by their 
desperate disappointment. Meeting an opposition they had 
had the egregious vanity, the egotistical infatuation, not to 
believe possible, they became infuriated, and when victory 
after victory was wrested from them and their hopes grew 
fainter with every battle, then all the malice and turpitude 
of devils seemed to fill their despairing leaders 1 hearts and to 
crowd out humanity and honor.” 

“ But how should honor consist with treason,” said Aletlii, 
“ or humanity with unnecessary blood-shedding ? ” 

“You are right,” replied Philoscommon. “It is a very 
bad cause, and very bad men have made or sustained it. 
But do you note their resemblance to the Philautians in their 
falsehoods and calumniation? It is not enough to have 
more than once violated their parole to replete their armies, 
not enough to have starved and exposed their prisoners with 
a determined cruelty that must have been not merely design 
but the gratification of hate, not enough to have sown the 
soil of their abandoned cities with explosive machines that 
the victors entering might meet with death or mutilation, 
not enough to have butchered in cold blood disarmed negroes 
who had surrendered to their mercy, not enough to have 
sought to poison aqueducts, burn cities, incite their mobs to 
insurrection,, or waste them with pestilence, but they must 
detract from magnanimity that shamed them, deny successes 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 859 

that filled them with despair, and vilify kindness that would 
have been as fire on their heads, had their brains been hu- 
man. From the arcli-traitor himself, through all his bur- 
lesque of a cabinet, down to many of their prominent military 
men, they did not hesitate to publish to the world falsehoods 
which they knew to be such, which their own position, and 
all their surroundings, and the succession of events showed 
to be such, and to impute to the loyalists the most in- 
famous designs and conduct, though their own people 
never could detect the one nor in their experience had 
knowledge of the other. One of the most atrocious of 
these acts of calumny w T as the forging of a military order or 
plan of conduct for the enterprise of a brave young National 
officer, good too and amiable as he w T as brave, so as to make 
it appear that he came on an expedition to the so-called Cap- 
ital with the intention of sacking, burning it, and giving up 
its inhabitants to every violence. The forgery was a lame 
one, for, on the face of it, it was absurd that any such plan 
of conduct would have been written out. Besides, it was in- 
consistent with every act of the National Government, whose 
humane and magnanimous course towards its assailants has 
never once varied, not even since this expedition, in antici- 
pation of which the rebels had mined their chief prison, in 
order to blow up their captives in case it had succeeded. 
The attempt therefore to fasten such a purpose on the youth 
■was extraordinary. Its object, however, w~as to rouse again 
the hearts of the people, which were beginning to flag, and 
with a reflex action to give a new theme abroad, where they 
knew the calumny would be welcome, for vituperation of the 
conquering loyalists. And this was always a chief aim with 
the rebel leaders. You see it manifested in all their head 
man’s addresses. The fables went to Pliilautia, were reprint- 
ed there, and welcomed.” 

“ Yes, but not believed.” 

“ Were n’t they ! Men always believe what they want to, 


360 


TRAVELS 13 Y SEA AND LAND 


and rarely what they don’t. Had it been asserted that the 
loyalists roasted Mesembrian babies and eat them with sweet 
potatoes, it would have been credited from one end of Phil- 
autia to the other.” 


CHAPTER LIV. 

Oar travelers meet again the grandson of the Duke of Paehy - 
c&phalus. His luminous discourse upon the war , and 
how the little schoolmaster answered him. 

It was about this time, — 'when the Rebellion was stag- 
gering under the slow but terrible blows of its assailant 

Though fighting still valiantly, blood was oozing through 
every joint of its armor, and though its face still haughtily 
glared upon its foe every step was backward. Yet, with a 
forced tone of confidence, it still claimed to lie successful, 
and its friends echoed loudly the empty vaunt. It was at this 
time, one day in a street of Pater'patra, whom should the 
friends encounter but their Proseoi'an and casual acquaint- 
ance, the red-haired, red-whiskered and red-faced cousin of 
Lord Daliphron and grandson of the Duke of Pachycephalus. 

He put out his hand cordially, saluting Philoscommon, 
however, familiarly with, “ Well, my odd fish, who would 
have looked to find you floundering here ? ” 

“ Anybody,” answered the schoolmaster, “ who had watched 
the course of the water.” 

“Ah — ah — yes — I recollect — by Jove ! You did come 
near being barbecued, did n’t you? Crymoker, he -went 
under, I read.” 

“Yes, we could not save him on our raft,” said Alethi, 
looking rather reproachfully at Philoscommon. 


OP ALETHITHEEAS, 


361 


“ He hurt his head in jumping out to us,” added the latter. 
“ But what wind blew you hither, Lieutenant ? ” 

“Captain, if you please,” said Thelyphron. “They have 
given me a hoist, you know. But, what blew me here, as 
you call it ? Ah — why, — I scarcely know, myself. O, I 
was curious to see how the fight got on here, you know ; and 
as I had some months’ furlough, and Daliphron was coming, 
why, you know, I thought I could n’t do better. I say, they 
are getting it pretty nicely, are n’t they ? ” 

“Which?” 

“ The rabble of the North, to be sure.” 

“ The loyalists, you mean.” 

“ If you like. But the tyrants are catching it, are n’t 
they ? ” 

“ It seems to me, you have got both the effect and the ob- 
ject wrong. The tyrants are indeed getting the worst of it, 
that is, the traitors of Mesembria ; for the true men of Aqui- 
lonia are plainly beating them.” 

“ Now, by Jove ! that is new. How do you make that out ? ” 

“ Not out of their reports, you may be sure. According to 
those, they are always the victors and everything is fair for 
them, besides Philautian favor. But I notice that wherever 
the National army sets its foot it never recedes, except to oc- 
cupy a better position, and that cities once taken by it are 
never surrendered, though they may be on occasion aban- 
doned. The area of conquest by the Aquilonians spreads 
more and more, and your conquerors of Mesembria shrink 
into smaller confines. But supposing you were right, what 
would yoq find to rejoice at ? ” 

“ The triumph of liberty, you know, and — and, you know, 
of human rights.” 

“ Through human slavery.” 

“Eh? O ! that is a trifle, you know. But how are you 
interested in the muss, who are strangers ? Are you for a 
republic ? ” 

16 


362 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ Only so far as it comes nearer to that distribution of 
equal rights which you have claimed to regard. But I am 
decidedly against an atrocious act like this ; first, a trick 
upon the electoral college ; then, a refusal to abide by the 
result they had pretended to invoke ; then, war, • — war, 
which should never be resorted to but in the last emergence, 
and, when resorted to without an imperative cause, the most 
atrocious of crimes. But they had determined on war, know- 
ing their aim could not be reached without violence, and 
believing, in their preposterously extravagant self-esteem, 
'that they, the feebler in numbers, the inferior in skill and in 
resources, were to conquer easily, — and so, for their selfish, 
devilish ambition, and with a proclamation of defiance to 
natural human right that was only less insolent than prepos- 
terous, the logical assumption and the ratiocination of fools 
or dotards, imbrue a whole continent in blood, set brothers 
against brothers, and open all the hell-doors to hate and 
every malignant passion.” 

The speaker’s whole face was lighted up, and if it did not 
look handsome, it was what was better in expression, ardent 
and manlike, and had ceased to be ugly. But the little red- 
faced captain’s eyes and nostrils and lips, although he was not 
ordinarily ill-natured, had their plainness made repulsive by 
the leer and wrinkle of envy. “You talk strongly,” he said, 
in derision. “You are an orator. Hear ! hear !” 

“ You will find,” said the schoolmaster gravely, “ that my 
talk is but feeble to the feelings that will one day be evoked ; 
for it cannot be that men who have so far done so wickedly 
will improve under continued defeat and disappointment. 
Already they have run up an account for cruelty and base- 
ness that will put their ephemeral pseudo-nation on a par 
with the bloodiest if not the most treacherous Powers of the 
Old World; and when the whole catalogue of their crimes 
shall be recorded in history, men hereafter will doubt if the 
conquerors and the conquered could have been of the same 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


363 


race, and will be forced to suppose in charity, that as, with 
the former, respect to human rights and solid education and 
sober living had humanized them and ennobled every gentler 
feeling, so the reverse had brutalized the others and leaving 
every savage passion unchanged had converted them into 
fiends.” 

“ Do you understand him ? ” asked the captain, turning to 
Alethi with what w r as meant to be a waggish look of supe- 
riority. 

“ I believe I do,” answered Alethi. “ He is prophesying 
for the benefit of your countrymen w r hen they shall have 
awaked from their delirium.” 

“ That is devilish kind of him, I am sure. I pray, who 
told you that we were in a delirium ? ” 

“The fact that you have overlooked your interests,” re- 
plied Alethi. 

“Ah, you mean that we ought to have declared openly for 
these Mesembrian gentry. So we would : but, you see, there 
was no saying how the thing was going to end ; and — and 
— in fact, by Jove, we wanted to, and the Alectryon Empe- 
ror wanted us to ; but he is such a slippery fellow, you know, 
and the blockading interest is going on, you know, so finely. 
You see, we have nearly swept their commerce from the seas, 
and our ow T n is doubling. Eh ? ” 

“ That is shrewdly said, captain, and truly said,” observed 
Philos'. 

“Eh, be sure ! by Jove ! and why should n’t it be? I can 
hit upon a good thing now and then, you know. But I say, 
you know, would n’t it be best for Old Philautia to have this 
overgrown dominion split into three or four, or half-a-dozen, 
as Werbul Tontyl said ? Would n’t it now ? ” 

“ I dare say it would, in one sense ; but in another, I think 
you would find you had brought your eggs to a wrong market.” 

“ By Jove, now, what is that ? I don’t understand him,” 

( turning to Alethi ; ) “ that is so vulgar ! ” 


364 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“ 0, my meaning is simple, Captain. You are a great na- 
tion, powerful as the Ariospolis of old, and as scrupulous and 
unrap acious.” The captain bowed. “ I like gentility, and 
you know I honor you for it.” 

“ 0, don’t talk of that,” remonstrated the captain, laughing 
lightly, and carressing with the tip of his walking-stick his 
varnished boot ; “ a man is as he does, you know.” 

“ Just so ( though it is very handsome in a cousin of Lord 
Daliphron’s to admit it. ) — And therefore, being so elevated 
above ordinary considerations and naturally contemners of a 
democracy, your nation does right either way ; but as she is 
also a trading nation, I think she will find that the true way 
to get along in business is not to break up your neighbor’s, 
although he may be your competitor.” 

“ Upon my word, you are as mysterious as the beast with 
the woman’s head they told of in college. But I dare say 
you mean well ; and one of these days will show which of us 
is right, you or I.” He held out a finger to Philos', and a 
hand to Alethi. 

The schoolmaster put both his hands behind him. “ And 
so,” he said, “it will whether the moon be made of green 
cheese. But none of us will live to taste it.” 

“ Ah, you ’re a droll one ! is n’t he now, by Jove ! Adieu.” 


\ 


OF ALETHITHEKAS. 


365 




CHAPTER LV. 

Wherein is related the end of the rebellion. The magna- 
nimity of the victors and the ungraciousness 
of the vanquished. 

The war drew rapidly to an end. Under the most con- 
summate captain of the age, inspired and sanctioned rather 
than directed by the great general who was at the head of 
the National forces and himself had led them always to vic- 
tory, almost the entire rebel country fell, piece after piece, 
into the hands of the true men, and, the conquering armies 
approaching together from the north and from the south, 
the forces, still large, of the enemies of peace and union and 
a puissant nationality, were brought as it were between the 
upper and the nether millstone, and to avoid annihilation 
surrendered. 

Then was seen the too precipitate magnanimity, the gentle 
generosity and the forgiving charity of the loyalists, whose 
Government indeed might be said alone to represent on earth 
the attributes which the Hebrew prophet ascribes to the Un- 
utterable One, — gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of 
great ldndness, and repenting it of the evil. They had already 
fallen into the. amiable error of exaggerating the merits of 
the brave fanatic whom Mesembria had made its hero, though 
they had themselves several high officers with veiy similar 
qualities as soldiers. This “ hero,” by the by, demonstrated 
by his death the meanness of the rebel leaders; for they 


366 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


grudged the loyal enemy even the accident of his mortality, 
and pretended it was caused by the careless firing of his own 
troops ! 

The remark was made by Philoscommon. “ One would 
have supposed,” observed Alethi, “ the disgrace of such a 
casualty as that would be more annoying than could possi- 
bly be his destruction by what you call an accident and, I 
suppose, mean the chance shot of a firearm, though even if 
deliberately aimed the bullet could carry with it no glory for 
the killer.” 

“ Yes, but this was of the characteristics of these men, 
who had taught themselves to look upon the traders and 
farmers of Aquilonia as destitute of military spirit, and were 
furious accordingly at their mistake and discomfiture. Well, 
in like manner, the loyalists now set themselves to praise the 
chief general of their adversaries. Regarding him, and 
justly, as misguided rather than a traitor, they forgot that 
he might well be held responsible for the atrocities commit- 
ted on the prisoners, since a word of his would have pre- 
vented their continuance, that he meanly misrepresented his 
reverses and extenuated or absolutely ignored the national 
victories, and finally that his ‘ order ’ announcing to his army 
his surrender puts a false face upon the circumstances of that 
surrender, and endeavors to make it appear rather as a capit- 
ulation. He does not even truly believe in the necessity of 
surrendering, yet he surrenders ; he is overwhelmed, not by 
the better fortune, the valor and skill of his opposite, but by 
his vast superiority in forces and in resources, although it is 
known that his own forces, at one time very little inferior in 
number, had been reduced by defeats and by consequent de- 
sertions.” 

“I have just been reading some remarks on that very sub- 
ject in the New-Euerwic Ghronicon ,” said Alethi. 

“ It is one of the most moderate and fair-dealing of politi- 
cal journals ,” returned Philoscommon. “ Let me hear what it 
says.” 


OP ALETHITHER AS. 


367 


Aletlii read. 

. . . “ ‘ Neither Lcimon nor Joannides, nor any of their officers have given 
the smallest sign of repentance. They have never uttered one expression of 
regret for the breach of their oaths, the desertion of their colors, and their 
four years’ struggle to destroy the government under which they were born, 
which educated them, and from which they had received nothing but kind- 
ness and consideration. They boast to this hour that they give up their 
swords only in obedience to stern necessity ; because fighting was become 
useless, defeat certain. Under all these circumstances we confess we can 
see in the pains taken to conceal the final evidence of the triumph of the 
law from the gaze of the public nothing but an unworthy and unbecoming 
revival of the flunkeyism which so long disgraced us, and something very 
like an impertinence to the army and the people.’ ” 

“It is justly said,” remarked the schoolmaster, “and re- 
minds me that a prevalent and dangerous fault in the whole 
Republic is to condone great crimes, and pass over all of- 
fences, especially in politics, as if they were accidents that 
were not worth any serious consideration. I verily believe 
that if these would-have-been assassins of their country were 
to murder the Archon himself, the atrocity would be forgot- 
ten — no, forgiven — in a twelvemonth, along with all those 
diabolical occurrences which have disgraced them since the 
war began. There is one I have just been reading of, my- 
self, that will show you they are not yet overi At the taking 
of the rebel capital, a powder-magazine which was close to 
the city almshouse was set fire to without removing its con- 
tents, and eight or ten of the miserable paupers perished by 
the explosion.” 

“ It is only a wonder to me that the villains had not laid 
it to the conquerors, as they did with the firing of one of the 
Mesembrian cities.” 

“ Probably they would, but the time is gone by when they 
had occasion.” 

“You spoke of General Leiraon as misguided. I don’t 
know that I understand you.” 

“ This great republic is divided into what are called States, 
whose governments revolve in their respective orbits around 


368 


TKAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


the central government, as the planets do around the sun, 
without which they are nothing and on which they are de- 
pendent for the maintenance of their position in the great 
system. But unfortunately the term sovereign , which is ap- 
plied to them, has been and is by many supposed to express 
their absolute supremacy and independence in themselves, 
and not as parts of one common whole which alone is sov- 
ereign and as respects their relations to foreign Powers. But 
however the phrase might be interpreted as confined to the 
original states which formed the Union, it is absurd as re- 
gards those which have since been made out of the common 
territory or bought in at the common expense. As I showed 
you before, it is one of the most singular traits of this great 
people that they seem to believe that any portion of them 
can take possession of any land however extensive belonging 
to the whole people, and when the number of their popula- 
tion is sufficient can demand to be considered a separate 
state, with this odd idea of actual sovereignty in itself and 
independence of the others. Now Leimon was brought up 
to believe, like almost all men south of the capital, in this 
preposterous fallacy. He had sworn to defend the whole 
union, or congeries, if you will, of states, and to maintain in- 
violate against all invaders their common constitution ; but 
the moment his state is juggled and infamously ( without 
indeed any cooperation or even consciousness on his part ) 
into the ranks of the rebellion, he believes his faith, his life 
were due to it, and drew his sword, reluctantly indeed, but 
determinedly, against the first object of his allegiance.” 

“ He might have resigned his commission in the service 
and retired forever into private life. That would have been 
bad enough, at the outbreak of a war. But what excuse 
was there for taking arms directly against the republic ? I 
can find nothing in that but treason ; if indeed it may not 
have been ambition ; for I noticed, that as a temptation to 
the loyal officers the upstart rebel government raised at once, 


OF ALETHITHERAS. 


369 


in many instances, such as would come over to them to a 
greater rank than they could ever hope to attain in the old 
army. Thus they made of a prelate, a man without any 
practical military knowledge, an officer higher than the very 
highest of all the great commanders whose blows were as 
thunder-bolts on the thin casques of him and his com- 
peers.” 

“It is well observed; and the act was of course treason; 
but yet I think, Alethi, Leimon was misguided, as thousands 
of brave and honest men have been in this, I was about to 
say, infernal conflict, but that God has caused it to be other- 
wise by its result. You may have noted that in his farewell 
order he calls his State his country .” 

“ Which adds to his crime persistence in the spirit of re- 
bellion, and the open boast of it when his surrender made 
such vaunts especially indecorous. It is like the last sob of 
a cross child, or the final perverse bark of a petted dog, after 
they have been ordered peremptorily to cease. I still see no 
excuse for your defeated general, except in the weakness of 
his principles. He wants that sternness which was thought 
to dignify the better men of Ariospolis of old ; such as he 
who returned deliberately to brave a death of torture rather 
than violate his plighted word.” 

16 * 


370 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


CHAPTER L Y I . 

The Assassination of the Archon. 

The war was virtually over. The travelers were still in 
Pater / patra. One night Aletlii rushed into their parlor, 
where Philoscommon sat musingly at the grate, his hands 
clasped behind his head and his slippered feet on the fender, 
and cried* out in a sort of loud whisper, “ The Archon is as- 
sassinated ! ” 

Philoscommon unclasped his hands and set down his legs, 
but answered quietly, though with serious concern, “I am 
not surprised at it ; 

‘ Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo : ’ 

it was the last appeal to Hell. But the villains meant to do 
more ? ” 

“ O yes, they have nearly murdered the prime-minister, and 
meant to put out of the way the Hyparclius, and the general- 
in-chief of the armies.” 

“ Meaning that the wdieels of government should stop, and 
the army lack its head to rectify the consequences. But they 
would have failed. You will see the car of state will move 
on without so much as being shaken in its fabric ; and would 
the murder of the commander-in-chief have removed that 
great soldier, his chief lieutenant ? ” 

“ This at least will horrify Philautia.” 

“For awhile; but only her best people. You will find 


\ 


OP ALETHITHEEAS, 


371 


that the iniquitous newspaper organ of her aristocracy will 
defend the assassination, and make common murder, when 
done for state reasons, not so heinous an offence after all. — 
Where and how did this take place ? ” 

“ In the theatre — by a pistol-ball — in the base of the 
skull. The assassin sprung over the box to the stage. By a 
notable coincidence, the flag he had desecrated caught in a 
spur he wore and caused him to fall, probably doing him an 
injury that may make easier his arrest. But rising to his 
feet, he brandished aloft a dagger, and reciting theatrically 
the defiant motto of one of the rebellious states, Thus ever to 
tyrants ! slipped behind the scenes and escaped.” 

“ Aided no doubt by co-operators there ; for the Capital is 
full of traitors, and has been ever since the war began. Is the 
Archon dead ? ” 

“Not yet ; but they say he is sinking. He is totally in- 
sensible, unconscious to sight and sound.” 

“ Coma.” 

“I suppose so. It ’s enough to make one doubt of 
Heaven.” 

“No. If it were the triumph of wickedness, one might; 
but not for the simple death of the righteous, even by vio- 
lence. For him, the gentle and the good, we cannot regret 
him; he will have died in the fulness of honor, and in the 
triumph of all that as the head of the nation he had contend- 
ed for. His violent death will add to his fame, and, as is 
usual with the multitude, will convert him into a martyr, and 
magnify his talents and his virtues, his intentions even, till 
they have put him on a par with Paterpatrise himself.” 

“ Then you have not formed a high opinion of his abili- 
ties?” 

“ On the contrary ; no one can read any of his pithy Mes- 
sages, where more is said in one sentence than men usually 
expand into paragraphs, without admiring his shrewdness, 
his good sense, his judgment in general. He is the very man 


372 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


I should have instanced as combining in himself, physically 
and intellectually, most of the peculiar and many of the best 
characteristics of his countrymen. But he was unmistakably 
led by events and not their mover. He would at first have 
made a compromise with Mesembria ; a most fatal act ; and 
when he abolished slavery, it was when the state of the war 
and the obstinacy of the rebels left him no alternative. He 
will have died a good and a wise man. If he have too, both 
here and abroad, the additional title of a great one, it will be 
no grosser an exaggeration of his qualities than is habitual 
with men to indulge-in in an access of enthusiasm, and to 
encourage in the fear that contradiction will give offence and 
perhaps be misinterpreted. Sequiescat ! the able instrument 
in the hands of the Almighty for His great purposes, laid by, 
not thrown aside, when its services had ceased to be needed, 
and though broken by human violence, yet never by human 
gratitude to be forgotten.” 


CHAPTER LVII. 

Sow the great army of Isopoliteia was disbanded and its 
thousand ships dispersed; with the consequences 
thereof on Philautian integrity. 

The gallows had its due. The miserable tools of a defunct 
Rebellion lay in unknown graves. The Hyparchus took the 
vacant seat, and in the face of the prophecies of the chief 
“ organ ” of the Philautian nobles, which, not hesitating to 
charge him with plotting himself the murder of his prede- 
cessor, foreboded all sorts of tyrannous excesses against the 
desolated South, proceeded in the work the deceased Archon 
had himself laid out. 

Then came that rapid diminution of the great army which 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


373 


was not less, if not more wonderful tlian its assemblage. 
Host after host dwindled, and thousands on thousands of 
officers disappeared into civil life, as if it were but the break- 
ing up of a political meeting or the retirement from the evo- 
lutions of a ball. Alethi himself was struck with admiration, 
as were all strangers. 

“ But you forget that I told you,” said Philoscommon, 
“ that ninety per-cent of these men, as is well-ascertained, are 
natives. Were they mercenary foreigners, without fixed 
homes, or interests suffering by their absence, you might have 
seen something different. The Yesputians, you observe, 
never w T onder. They are so used to do things with ease which 
the rest of the world consider impossible, that they take it 
calmly, nor do even those who lose by the change presume to 
murmur. You will see something more, presently. The 
Chaunopolis Weathercock , which tried, I told you, to break 
down the financial credit of the Republic, now pretends, 
with a like motive, that it will repudiate the vast debt it has 
accumulated. But you will see that these heroes, who have 
offered their blood and endangered their household interests 
for their country, will cheerfully submit to, nay call for taxa- 
tion ; and that, like frozen snow in the advent of Spring, the 
heap will gradually melt away till all indebtedness has dis- 
appeared.” 

“ But the Philautians will never believe this. I met Thel- 
ypliron yesterday, who seemed to exult in the Weathercock’s 
prediction. I reminded him of his country’s debt, accumu- 
lated I did not say in mostly unrighteous wars, and I asked 
him if he thought this vast dominion and great people, with 
resources and population constantly and rapidly on the in- 
crease, would be behindhand.” 

“ And what did he say ? But I need not ask. By Jove r 
now ! that is so very odd a question , you know! And — and — 
hy Jove ! But Philautians who are not asses like him, and 
men, too, intimate with finance, will tell you the same. Yet,” 


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TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


said Philosc, “ I look around me. I see where their feeble or 
envy-blinded vision cannot reach. I see” (his little eyes 
grew singularly brilliant, as they looked forward, not on 
Alethi, but seemingly into infinite space) “ this unexhausted 
soil renew its measureless products, the commerce crippled 
through Philautian enmity and double-dealing spread again 
its white wings over every sea ; I look behind and under the 
ridge of mountains that runs through the midst but does not 
part the East and West, and I see the earth stored with more 
of mineral wealth than perhaps all the rest of the world to- 
gether could agglomerate. I see Mesembria waking up from 
her exhaustion, and with a better feeling and the elasticity of 
fresh enterprise set to work to resuscitate her dying agricul- 
ture, and her fields once more overgrown with the most im- 
portant of all vegetable products. And I remember that this 
nation has twice already done what none other ever did, paid 

all its debts ; and so remembering But, Alethi, the 

minds of otherwise honest Philautians even here are poisoned 
by the domestic enemies of the Government. During the 
whole war, journals, which were secretly or openly in the 
interests of the revolutionists, have made it their special 
business to assail its credit in every way, and in the very 
teeth of figures persisted in doubling the estimate of its 
debt. But while Philautians, naturalized as w T ell as alien, 
have eagerly accepted these dicta, and maintained their truth 
with a somewhat suspicious heat of zeal, the Yesputians, 
even those who acted with the implacable party, put no real 
faith in them, and the bonds of the Government only seem 
to go up higher and higher in the market for these monetary 
declamations. So Heaven, my son, has defended the right. 
Timid men may have wavered, the feeble-minded and 
despondent doubted, traitors and that most heartless class 
of sordid politicians, the thorough-paced demagogues, af- 
fected to disbelieve, and insinuated their pretended infi- 
delity into their disloyal, or ignorant and dissolute hearers, 


OF ALETHITHER AS. 


375 


but the heart of the great nation has throbbed only with a 
dauntless hope and a defiant scorn, and its nerves have been 
strung but with greater tenseness in the determination to put 
down forever, if it took the lifetime of a generation and cost 
a tithe of all they possessed, this damnable wickedness.” 

“You are almost a Vesputian,” said Alethi, smiling at the 
schoolmaster’s enthusiasm. 

“ No, I would not be if I could. Between this still new 
country and the rest of the world we have visited if I must 
choose, I would pitch my tent here. But, till then, I prefer 
to keep clean of demagogues, political corruption and mal- 
versation, whether in state or kingdom, and be, as I am, of 
Medamou.” 

At that moment, the sound of military music called the 
friends to the window, and they saw marching by, in the 
spacious street, one of those now shrunken regiments with 
their faded uniforms and battle-torn and discolored flags, 
which had done so much for manhood, loyalty and their 
country. The travelers lifted the sash and cheered impul- 
sively. The veterans raised their bronzed faces, spare of 
flesh but healthy-looking, and answered with a lusty shout, 
though some among them smiled at Philoscommon’s comical 
appearance. 

“ Poor dogs ! ” said that philosopher sentimentally, “ they 
have had no amusement in a great while. I am glad my 
nose refreshes them.” 

The men were on their way to their homes, satisfied with 
having done their duty, of which eight out of ten of their 
original number were, in the graveyard, mute and moulder- 
ing witnesses. The excitement of the moment over, it was a 
sight to make men serious, if not sad. 

“ And what,” said Alethitheras as he closed the window, 
“ will be the result of this disbandment which is going on so 
vigorously ? ” 

“ As respects the rebel states, or foreign Powers ? ” 


376 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


“Both.” 

“ As respects the latter, wait for some months, and ask me 
then. Meantime I can tell you that the Prows Keryx , which 
is the organ of that very large class of Philautians, who, 
having in their own homes every comfort they can desire, 
with the gout, believe religiously that Philautia is the best- 
governed as well as greatest kingdom in the world, and that 
all cries of reform are either ill-considered or emanate from 
revolutionists, is exulting over the prospect, with which it 
fools its malignity, of fresh bloodshed, continued desolation, 
and the proximate rise of a new generation to renew the 
horrible strife ( thus, devilishly, suggesting its renewal ) that 
has cost half a million of brave men their lives and proved 
the ruin of thousands of honest families.” 

Several months passed, and the travelers, who had during 
that interval made extensive visits into the scenes of the 
newly extinguished war, were returned to their winter quar- 
ters in Pater / patra, when one day Philoscommon, who had a 
newspaper in his hand, broke out : 

“Well, I thought the Yesputians were a wise people. I 
am afraid I shall have to change my mind.” 

“ What have they done ? ” 

“Why, they have stripped themselves of the power of 
enforcing a demand of justice, and then pretend to present 
it.” 

“I don’t understand you.” 

“ The Philautians would. Had the Yesputian Government, 
before it disbanded its vast army and dispersed its navy, 
called upon the Philautian for redress for its manifest wrongs 
and insults, do you suppose it would have been refused ? It 
has been now, as might have been expected. Hear what 
says the Foreign Minister of the offending Power, as he closes 
the long correspondence between his office and the Yesputian 
embassy, a correspondence which has developed on the part 
of the former the most miserable shifts and shufflings, and 


OP ALETHITHEKAS. 


377 


casuistical reasoning, and garbled citations of facts again 
and again corrected and made whole to be again and again 
cut down and distorted, in short the most contemptible sub- 
terfuges to avoid the acknowledgment of wrongdoing and 
the responsibility of rectification, that ever disgraced even 
that perfidious Government. 

. . ‘It is . . my duty,’ says the official nobleman, ‘in 
closing this correspondence to observe, that no armed vessel 
( note the subterfuge — no armed vessel ) departed during 
the war from a Philautian port to cruise against the com - 
merce of Isopoliteia , and to maintain that, throughout all the 
difficulties of the civil war by which Isopoliteia has lately 
been distracted, ... the Philautian Government have stead- 
ily and honestly discharged all the duties incumbent on them as 
a neutral Power , and have never deviated from the obliga- 
tions imposed on them by international law? 

“ And thus,” continued Philoscommon, “ ends the long ar- 
gument, with the repetition of a deliberate lie, — a coarse 
phrase perhaps to apply to a class of persons whose word of 
honor is accepted where is exacted the oath of meaner men, 
but which is, in its very coarseness, best fitted to stigmatize 
what should have emanated only from the coarsest and ob- 
tusest mind. But what other end could be expected ? With 
arms, as I said, in their hands, and their fleet in readiness, 
Philautia might have acceded to their demands ; but to ex- 
pect that those who had deliberately been guilty of the out- 
rage would, except under compulsion, openly acknowledge 
it and propose to make atonement, was to expect repentance 
in a successful burglar, or that the footpad should at the en- 
treaty of his defenceless victim surrender his booty and make 
apology. If ever footpad and burglar w r ere so conscience- 
pricked, yet that embodiment of the spirit of highway-rob- 
bery and housebreaking which is the Philautian Government 
in its foreign relations has not one pore where compunction 
can enter. It is only by the lash that it can be stimulated to 


$78 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


that regret of unsuccessful iniquity which with most crimi- 
nals is the only sorrow that takes the form and name of re- 
pentance.” 


CHAPTER LVIII. , 

The Traveler begins to weary. 

The winter was now over — in the almanac. The Water- 
bearer and the Fishes had ceased to dictate to the town- 
clocks, and the Ram was making ready to embrace the Sun. 
The question of the rehabilitation of the insurgent states 
was still unsettled, and men’s minds in Isopoliteia were, as 
they usually are there, in daily excitation. Alethitheras had 
appeared of late to be pensive, if not sorrowful. He had 
seen, through Philoscommon’s glasses, so much of human 
baseness and found such vanity in human aspirations, that 
he began to doubt what good this sad experience did him 
and to weary of the quest of Odyssean knowledge. 

One morning, when the big flakes of a March snowstorm 
were driving aslant in the humid air, Alethitheras had 
turned from the window where, with his nose against the 
glass, his partner stood, perhaps admiring the feathery 
shower, perhaps calculating the prospect of clearer weather 
when the sun should be more high, and was walking up and 
down the room with his chin upon his breast and his thumbs 
in his waistcoat pockets, deep in thought. It may be the 
little schoolmaster was not after all busied with the snow- 
flakes, but desirous to leave his friend and patron to his pre- 
vailing humor ; for when the latter, stopping in his walk, 
called to him, he turned about briskly, as if relieved. 

“Philos 7 ,” said the younger traveler, “you compared for 


379 


i 

OF ALETHITHERA8. 

me these states in their relation to the Central Government 
to the planets about the sun.” — 

“It is nothing original,” interposed the schoolmaster; 
“ the image is as familiar as the movement.” 

“ Do you think then, that those, which, as some Philautian 
somewhere says, have shot so madly from their spheres, will 
resume their ancient orbits ? ” 

“ Yes, by virtue of necessity, not by natural gravitation.” 

“ Then there is no real reconciliation, you think ? ” 

“ I would not say so. You have seen the testimony of Gen- 
eral Leimon. It is prevaricating and evasive. He seems to 
know nothing certain, yet you may clearly gather from his 
want of frankness that there is doubt on his part. And the 
evidence of the more reliable National generals goes to show, 
that now the heel is lifted the subjected spirit begins to 
rise.” 

“ So that, though so ready to give in their submission, 
they are really not in heart good citizens. Is that your 
thought ? In other words, do you believe that they would 
take advantage of a foreign war, or such like contingency, 
to rise again ? ” 

“ I don’t know how far men who have been guilty of so 
much baseness may be ready to renew it ; but I do know, 
that if a whole people can act like a man who being con- 
quered in a duel, and receiving his life from his enemy, takes 
the first opportunity to join with another foe to attack him, 
they deserve to be exterminated.” 

“ But you have no apprehension of such iniquity ? ” 
“None in the least. The mass of the people were mis- 
guided , as I said of many of the officers ; but the race is the 
same as that of their vanquishers, and when the soreness of 
the wounds inflicted on their overweening pride and self- 
conceit, the smart of disappointment, and the anguish aris- 
ing from material injuries to their personal fortunes, shall 
have lessened, they will be in a fair way of recovery. Do you 


380 


TRAVELS BY SEA AND LAND 


think, had you been soundly thrashed in a fight provoked by 
yourself, perhaps with your own brother, you would at once 
embrace your conqueror? The Jesousians at the south do 
not like to turn the cheek to the smiter any more than else- 
where. By and by, the bad minds that are still among 
them, though they will not cease to teach, will cease to guide, 
and finally be totally unheeded ; and the return of prosper- 
ity, probably greater than before the war, will do the rest. 
Will you stay here and await the consummation ? ” Philos- 
common asked this with a smile. 

“ No,” said Alethi, positively. 


CHAPTER LIX. 

The Grand Result. 

“ But you have not seen half of this prodigious country,” 
objected Philoscommon. 

“I don’t care for that,” returned Alethi, with still more 
positiveness. 

“ And you were so anxious to know the Isopoliteians ; you 
were so sure you would like them,” pursued the pedagogue, 
throwing his visage into the most insinuating contortions. 
Such perhaps beheld Mehetabel one memorable day. 

“ That was your fault. I looked through the wrong end 
of the glass.” 

“You have the tube right now, however. Shall I adjust 
it ? ” The little man with both arms drew out the visionary 
telescope, and stooping (though that was not needed) looked 
mimetically through the smaller end. “Will you explore 
further ? ” 

“ Deuse take you,” said Alethi, smiling in spite of himself, 
“ no ; shut up the instrument.” 


OP ALETHITHERAS. 


881 


Pliiloscommon made tlie sign. “ Shall we then return, my 
darling, to the splendor and filth of New Euerwic, to its 
poverty and opulence, its luxury and misery, its ample chari- 
ties and expansive political depravity, to its mongrel popu- 
lation, its bipedal hogs, old garbage-boxes and blind beggars, 
shall we revisit the marble ‘ lazarliouse of nations,’ and taking 
ship thence for Chrysochora see our friend the Editor once 
more, and then away to the sunny islands of the Quiet Ocean, 
where the maids are many that have Minnchen’s eyes, and 
more that have her heart ? ” 

“ No,” said Alethi ; “no, again; and ten times no. I have 
had enough of travel both by Sea and Land, enough of search 
among the minds and manners of my fellow men.” 

“ And women,” said Philoscommon. “ Then you will end 
here ? ” His eyes and mouth, as he spoke, sparkled and rip- 
pled to the brim with facetious enjoyment. 

“ I will end here,” said Alethi, as if he beheld in mind his 
death and burial. 

“ And have you found the object of your search ? ” said the 
ex-valet, settling himself in a chair with his short legs on the 
round and his large hands under him. 

“ Nowhere,” said the patron, mournfully. 

“ Then I have found mine,” returned the little man, while 
he swung his now pendant legs alternately, like one of his 
own schoolboys. 

“ And what is that ? ” asked Alethitheras. 

The schoolmaster of Medamou laughed loudly and long, 
to the whole width of his jaws. 

And that was his answer. 


END . 




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